The Unseen Days
by ShootingStarNeoEevee
Summary: For 358 days, Roxas was the thirteenth member of the Organization... but what happened on the other days, that the game didn't choose to divulge? New chapters: We interrupt this hiatus for headcanon and feels.
1. Cooking Lessons

**Because I know I can still make something silly out of the Organization after 358/2 Days, right? :D **

_**The Unseen Days**_

Chapter 1: Cooking Lessons

_Day 81_

_For most of the day, all the members of the Organization are on our own for meals. Except dinner, because then Xemnas likes us to all get together and eat. Xigbar calls it "family time." Larxene used to call it "a huge pain in the-"(with the last word cut off because Axel put a hand over her mouth to stop her talking. This isn't the smartest thing to do, by the way. Axel has the scars to prove it). _

_So anyway, every day, it falls to one of us to make dinner (but Xigbar always just orders pizza). And today, I got the most unusual mission…_

Roxas strolled into the Grey Area, yawning and stretching his arms high above his head, sighing in contentment as the kinks worked out of the muscles. _Wonder what Saix'll send me out to do today… _He thought, ruffling his hair and wincing when his gloved fingers brushed a fresh bruise on the back of his head. _Hope it's not another giant Heartless… _Roxas grimaced as he remembered the monster from yesterday. It had been absolutely enormous, and there were tentacles everywhere. And for some reason, Axel wouldn't stop smirking at the word "tentacles" when Roxas told him about it later at the clock tower over ice cream (well, until he told Axel how it had grabbed Xion, where upon his smile had faded instantly, to be replaced with a look of quiet horror).

"Morning," Roxas called to the others in the Grey Area. Two of the four Nobodies present, Luxord and Xigbar, both returned the greeting in their own ways (a disinterested "Good morning" and an enthusiastic "Mornin' tiger!" respectively, before they went back to their game of Go Fish), while Xion looked up from her book and gave Roxas a cheery wave. Roxas smiled and waved back, feeling that familiar little clench in the heart he didn't have as he remembered her missing Keyblade; the reason why they had to do all their missions together. Saix, whose scarred, scowling face usually brought these thoughts up (_if he _ever_ found out about her…_), stood by the window, clipboard in hand as per usual, looking as disapproving as ever.

"Number XIII…" Saix drawled, with no preamble, consulting his clipboard as Roxas approached him. "You are to report to the kitchen at four o' clock sharp this afternoon. You are…" the Luna Diviner's lip curled downward in a frown, "On _dinner duty_ tonight." He growled. This didn't surprise Roxas, as it was common knowledge that Saix detested the Organization's "family time"

The mission itselfsurprised him, though. Roxas hadn't been expecting something so… _normal_, after all the missions that involved smacking Heartless around. That was, after all, the reason they kept him and Xion around, right? "Er…" Roxas stammered, bewildered, "what… am I supposed to do, exactly?"

Saix sighed impatiently, "Just make something edible and make sure there's enough for all of us. And before you say anything, Axel will be supervising, and you will be with Number XIV." He added before Roxas could protest.

Over on the couch, Xigbar looked up from his game of Go Fish. "Tiger and Poppet are making dinner?" He asked no one in particular.

Luxord's didn't look up from his cards. "It seems so," he murmured, eyes flicking through his hand.

"With Axel?"

"Indeed," The Gambler of Fate paused, "…fifty munny says they blow up the kitchen." He bet.

"You're on. Hey, got any twos?"

"Go fish,"

At four o' clock that afternoon, just as Saix had ordered them, the two younger members of Organization XIII went down to the kitchen. Hidden deep within the bowels of the Castle That Never Was, it was the only room that looked truly out of place. Whereas the rest of the castle put an emphasis on shades of whites and grays with little periwinkle accents, and sharp edges and arches all culminating in a sort of futuristic gothic look, the kitchen looked… _normal. _It was normal, from the smooth white tiles on the floor to the wooden kitchen island to the white-washed cabinets that lined the walls. The only things that really looked like they would fit in with the rest of the scheme were a refrigerator that was plated with chrome, and a black stove (which had rounded edges instead of the sharp ones required of the rest of the castle, so it might not have counted).

But Xion and Roxas, knowing about as much about architecture and interior design as your average teenager (that is to say, nothing at all) didn't take much notice of this; they just rolled up their sleeves and got to work.

Or, at least, they tried to. They knew about as much about cooking as they did about architecture and the like.

"I see leftovers," Roxas commented as he searched through the big fridge, "Lots and lots of leftovers."

"I found a package of Oreos," Xion called from across the room as she rummaged through the cupboards, "Unopened, too. How's Xigbar not found these yet?"

"They'd have to be hidden inside a box of Cheerios. He wouldn't touch them, then."

"Hang on… they were. Huh, they must be Vexen's, then."

Roxas smiled devilishly, "Well, they're fair game now!"

Xion returned the grin and hid the little cream-filled bits of deliciousness back inside their bland disguise. "After dinner, then," She said.

Roxas went back to searching the fridge. Some of this stuff looked like it hadn't been touched for ages; several of the plastic containers (though at this point Roxas was beginning to suspect they were made of something stronger than plastic, if they had to contain what had surely become radioactive substances by now) were covered in a fuzzy green mold. He dared not open any of them; for fear that whatever was inside them would overpower the unholy amounts of baking soda in the fridge, which must've been drowning out any smell to begin with.

Roxas gave the fridge up as a bad job, shutting the doors before one of those containers could mutate into some slimy thing and make an attempt on his life, and looked instead in one of the cabinets. As soon as he pulled it open, he was reminded of Agrabah – it was the smell, for sure. It was the smell of spices, hot and exotic. _Hm. Spice cabinet. Zexion would've hated this, _Roxas noted, remembering the Cloaked Schemer's sensitive sense of smell as he rummaged through containers of cinnamon and cumin and loads of things he couldn't remember the names of.

Xion, on the other hand, had managed to locate the canned soup stores, and couldn't help but wonder if somebody in the castle was planning ahead for an apocalypse. "If all else fails," she said to herself, "we can always just have soup." Just then, her searching was interrupted by Roxas shouting, "Hey, I think I found something!"

Number XIV moved briskly across the room to join her friend. The Key of Destiny was holding up two little packets he had apparently found in the spice cabinet, both labeled "taco seasoning." "Do you remember that one day when Xemnas made Mexican food?" He asked.

Xion tilted her head to the side, trying to remember. "Yeah…" She said, and then made a face, "That was a weird night."

"Well, as long as we don't decide to add his 'secret ingredient,' we should be fine." Roxas said, grinning, handing one packet over to Xion and flipping his over. "Directions, then… it says to cook one pound of ground beef until brown…"

Xion looked up. "But where would we find ground beef?" She wondered aloud.

"I dunno…" Roxas answered, fingering his packet of spices absentmindedly… then seizing the corner and tearing it open. "Doesn't look like there's any in here…" He said, peering inside. Then, in a lapse of judgment that would come back to bite him in a second, Roxas tipped up the open packet to get a better look… and got a literal eyeful of whatever seasoning was packaged inside.

Axel appeared in the kitchen doorway a few minutes later, to the sight of his two friends desperately trying to flush God-only-knew what out of Roxas's eyes. "What happened here?" Axel asked, quite seriously at first… but he quickly had to suppress a snort as Roxas emerged from the kitchen sink, with his face wet, hair dripping, his eyes bloodshot, and a very grumpy look on his face; he looked a bit like a cat that had just been forced into taking a bath.

"Taco seasoning," Roxas growled, "is _painful._"

Axel stared at the younger Nobody until it dawned on him what had happened. "How'd you get taco seasoning in your eyes, Roxas?" Axel asked, trying to keep that exasperated "big brother" tone out of his voice, which he had found himself slipping into more and more after Roxas had started getting curious about the world.

"Don't ask," Roxas answered grouchily, stomping away from the sink, "but I'm not going near that stuff ever again."

"Alright, alright…" Axel said, holding up his hands in a gesture to show he meant no harm. He then turned to Xion, glad that she could be the level-headed one in times like these. "What happened?" Axel asked her in a low voice, so the brooding Roxas wouldn't overhear.

"We were trying to find ground beef." Xion answered, shrugging. "I guess it wasn't in the packet…"

Axel's face said "hello" to his palm. "I swear," He groaned, "you two are a handful sometimes…"

Axel strode over to the refrigerator, throwing the double doors open wide and looking through the contents. "So you were trying to make tacos?" He called across the kitchen.

"Yeah," Xion answered, bounding over to Axel and ducking under his arm to help him search. "We got stuck when we tried to find ground beef, though. Is there any in here?"

"Yes," Said Axel, patiently. "See, meat goes bad if you leave it out, so we put it in the fridge and keep it cold."

"It wouldn't be a problem for Vexen, though, would it?"

"Yes, well, Vexen is no longer with us," Xion couldn't help but guess there was more to that statement that Axel wasn't telling her, "so we make due with what we have."

"…I thought the fridge was for keeping those… leftovers." The way she said it, you'd think _leftovers_ was the name of some kind of horrible giant Heartless.

"That too," Axel answered, "But we need HazMat suits to dispose of them, and the last time I saw one of those lying around was before me and the Castle Oblivion team left..."

As he rambled on about the disposal of various hazardous materials, Axel rapidly searched through the fridge's inner drawers and hidey-holes, until he pulled out a squishy tube, bound in brightly color plastic with little ties on either end.

"For future reference, Xion," Axel announced, holding his find in front of her, "this is what ground beef looks like before it's cooked. Got it memorized?"

Xion tilted her head to the side, determined to commit the image to memory as Axel had suggested, but puzzled at the same time. "Is it always so… colorful?"

"No, that's just the packaging. Hey, Roxas!" Axel called. The still-dripping Nobody looked up at the sound of his name. "C'mere, I'm gonna show the both of you how to cook this. Don't give me that look; the taco seasoning doesn't get involved until afterwards."

Roxas walked over, and both he and Xion watched as Axel demonstrated the first steps to making tacos.

"Now, remember kids," Axel instructed them, while sawing into the plastic wrap on the meat with one of the sharp points of his chakrams, "I am a professional chakram user. Do not try this at home. Got it memorized?" Once he'd cut a long slit in the plastic, Axel took a step back. "Now, which one of you wants to try getting it out of the tube?"

"I'll do it!" Xion volunteered, as she stepped in front of the stove, bouncing on her heels.

"Alright," Axel told her, "You're going to bend the tube so the ends touch and the cut's on the top side – and squeeze it all out."

"…it looks like brains," Xion noted, as she worked the pink, raw meat out of its container.

"Or that stuff that came out when I hit that tentacle monster Heartless." Roxas added.

Axel raised an eye brow. "One of these days," he told Roxas, very seriously, "You have to tell me exactly what happened when you fought that Heartless."

"Alright, but only if you tell me why you're freaking out about it." Roxas answered.

Axel thought it over for a moment.

"Agreed. But first I have to find a copy of Legend of the Overfiend. And a few gallons of mind-bleach."

"Guys?" Xion reminded them, pointing towards the lump of raw hamburger meat, sitting in the pan and still shaped like the plastic tube it had come out of. "We still have dinner to make."

"Right, right…" Axel put his mind back to teaching his friends how to cook. "Xion, try and find some more meat in the fridge. Roxas, you're going to have to chop it up so we can cook it evenly…"

"Is this gonna take much longer?" Roxas complained, watching the skillet on the lit stove, with its two tubes worth of ground up meat simmering away and slowly turning from the color of Marluxia's hair to a well-done brown.

"You asked that about two minutes ago." Axel noted, watching right along with Roxas and getting more than a little bored himself. This was the part he hated the most about cooking.

"It is taking a long time," Xion agreed, from her position by the cupboard, where she was working her way through the puzzles on the back of a Lucky Charms box. "Everyone else is probably wondering when it's gonna be done..."

Axel stood up abruptly, tugging on the ends of his gloves, "Alright then," he mused loudly, "if it's taking this long on four hundred degrees..." Axel gave his fingers a dangerous flex, causing the flames on the stove to flare high and bright, "then it should take no time at all on _Axel_ degrees!"

Xion had quickly realized what Axel was about to do, "Axel, no!" She shouted, "_The gas is still on-!_"

_KA-BOOM._

* * *

Fortunately, and most improbably, not one of the intrepid trio was hurt. Roxas, however, would be missing an eyebrow for a few weeks.

Unfortunately, the entire kitchen was a charred mess. The only thing that survived were the Oreos Xion has attempted to smuggle out in her pockets – Xigbar caught her eating them while he was ordering pizza and, in a rare display of his authority as the second member of the Organization, confiscated them immediately.

On the bright side, the leftovers were incinerated, saving some poor soul the trouble of having to dispose of them. Axel, however, was banned from the kitchen for life.

_So Axel's not allowed in the kitchen anymore, Demyx is going to be on clean-up duty for the next week or so, and Xigbar now owes Luxord fifty munny. _

_I really wonder if there ever is a dull day around here. When we're not on potentially life-threatening missions, everyone does the weirdest things, and I can't figure out why. That brings me to another interesting story, which Axel keeps insisting never actually happened. It was before I started coming to the clock tower with Xion, during this huge storm…_


	2. The Storm, Pt 1

_It happened less than a month after I joined the Organization, but it was after that first week. Apparently, it sometimes rains in the World That Never Was. Occasionally, it also storms. And sometimes, when it storms, something about it gets so bad (I don't know exactly what. Vexen tried explaining it to me once, though; I think I fell asleep while he was talking) that Dark Corridors in and out of Never Was don't work. So one day, there was a huge thunderstorm, and all fourteen of us were stuck at the castle until further notice. Then, Demyx asked us to play a game... _

* * *

Unseen Days: Chapter 2

The Storm, Part 1

* * *

Rain poured down on The World That Never Was, bathing the dark, broken world in wet washes, that reflected the eerie glow of the dead city's lights in a way that was, quite conveniently, perfect for a climatic battle. The thick clouds obscured any starlight that there might've been, and the city was thrown into sharp relief with every flash and crackle of lightning as the storm raged on, providing the most perfect of backdrops for the epic clash of wits and courage, known only as…

"Alright, Roxas, truth or dare?"

Demyx, Luxord, Axel, and Roxas sat in a circle in the Grey Area, playing their game as a veritable tempest lashed against the windows. Demyx has suggested it, mostly because the weather left all Organization XIII members grounded until further notice… that, and the cable was out. And the internet connection was down. And Xigbar, Zexion and Lexaeus were hogging the Wii that was in the TV room.

Roxas responded to Demyx's challenge with, "Truth," saying it as thought it was the most obvious thing in the world. Demyx groaned.

"You always pick that!" He whined.

"Because Axel told me to always pick that," Roxas said. Axel smirked at Demyx's frustrated glare; he had taught Roxas well. Besides, no dares meant no one would be taking advantage of Axel's young charge.

"Fine…" Demyx said, "What's… your favorite food?"

"Sea salt ice cream!" Roxas answered enthusiastically. Then there was quiet for a minute until Axel reminded him, "Roxas, it's your turn."

"Demyx," Roxas said, very suddenly, "truth or dare?"

"Dare!" Demyx said, the look in his eyes challenging Roxas to do his worst. Axel, however, really wasn't expecting anything spectacular, and he suspected Luxord and Demyx had the same expectations; Roxas simply didn't get the point of this game (that being exploitation and blackmail material).

"I dare you…" Roxas began, drawing out the moment, "to go flood the round room!"

Crash. Burn. There went all of those expectations. They all stared at Roxas, surprised. Demyx seemed to hesitate for a second, and then...

With no Demyx-ish retort or quipping, the Melodious Nocturne slowly got up. For once, he seemed more like the stoic Lexaeus than himself. Then, Demyx turned and wordlessly disappeared through a Dark Corridor.

As soon as his Demyx's footfalls vanished into the Corridor, silence flooded in, just like the water that the other three imagined was now gushing through their meeting room.

"Let's hope Lady Luck is with Demyx tonight. He'll get Dusked if he's caught…" Luxord murmured, sounding incredulous.

"Oh, Xemnas'll go beyond that," Axel retorted, "And we'll be short one less whiner." He grinned, and wasn't surprised to see little reaction from Luxord, though he imagined his smile would've been a chilling sight for one with a Heart.

Roxas, too, was grinning like that freaky Wonderland cat, and seemed to be trying to suppress giggles. The gravity of the situation was flying completely over his head.

"How'd you come up with something like that?" Axel asked his young friend.

Roxas smiled up at him, "I got the idea after that one time they made you strip naked and run around the castle." He said cheerily. The grin fell off Axel's face. He'd been hoping Roxas had forgotten_ that_ little incident...

So they waited, with the tension thick enough that, if their Superior did happen to storm in, pseudo-lightsabers blazing and ready to slice them to ribbons for their stupidity, he'd only succeed in cutting out comical donut shapes, like in those old cartoons. No one spoke again; they just sat and waited for Demyx to return.

And he did, several minutes later. Demyx was soaked, dripping from head to toe, and strangely solemn. He sat down, still acting more like the Silent Hero Lexaeus than himself, and said, "It is done."

Luxord and Axel stared, incredulous, while Roxas was still grinning. This time, they were the ones who forgot they were playing the game, until Demyx, very jarringly, reverted to his cheerier self. "Axel!" He chirped, "Truth or dare?"

_Oh no_, Axel thought, _I'm _not_ going to be outdone by the Organization's _slacker_. _"Dare!" He said, thinking that there was no way they could outdo making him streak through the castle.

That notion was immediately challenged when Demyx's face split into – there was no other word for it – into a _demonic_ toothy smile that Axel had no idea Demyx was capable of making. It hit him like a knife to the chest, and, suddenly, Axel really didn't want to know what Demyx had in store for him.

"You," Demyx started, pointing ominously at Axel, "have to make out with Roxas," Axel was surprised when he felt his face heat up at the thought of that, "For five minutes. And at least one of you has to use your tongue."

Axel's mind was suddenly blank. Roxas got his attention by tapping on him on arm, "Hey Axel," he asked, like a kid much younger than he actually was, "What's 'making out'?"

Axel took a deep breath. A part of him had hoped Roxas would never find out about the… more… passionate side of life, but if the cat was out of the bag now...

"Roxas, 'making out' is when two people like each other – a lot – and they... touch." Axel then added, "With their lips."

"It's quite intense," Luxord added, "and some people like to make a bit of a game out of it." This, of course, only earned a confused look from Roxas.

"Ever had your first kiss, Axel?" Demyx chuckled. Axel gave them both a glare, his fingers twitching with the urge to snap his fingers and roast some part of the other Nobodies. Preferably something delicate, that would really sting for a long while...

"Alright," Axel said slowly, hooking his arms under Roxas's and pulling the smaller Nobody closer, onto his lap. "Roxas, this is going to feel a little weird. You might want to close you eyes."

Axel didn't wait to see if Roxas took his suggestion. He closed his own eyes and leaned in, slowly. It helped a little that Roxas didn't move... Gradually, their lips touched, and softly molded against each other.

That was it, really. After that, Axel just sat and waited for it to be over. But, somehow, at the same time, he didn't want it to stop. The kiss, freaky as it was, was making him feel _something_; a twist in the pit of his stomach, and a weird dizzy feeling, coupled with every instinct screaming at him to pull away, and then hide under a rock somewhere. There was a word for this; he knew there was. But his memory couldn't quite place it…

It seemed to go on forever, but Axel knew he'd have to get to this part eventually or not fulfill all of Demyx's challenge. Cautiously, Axel gave Roxas's mouth a quick lick...

"What on earth is going on here?" Someone snapped. Roxas jumped backwards, flushed pink, breaking the awkward kiss, while Axel snapped his head around to see Saix, his closest friend from his when-I-had-a-heart days… who had just walked in on Axel making out with their new member. Awkward.

"You four," Saix growled, stomping towards them from a Dark Corridor, soaking wet and clearly having ascended to a new plane of his usual "I hate everything" attitude, "would any of you care to explain what I just saw – and why there is now _ten feet of water_ in our meeting room?"

Demyx shrank back, clearly aware that his clothes were still dripping onto the floor. Luxord stayed quiet as Roxas stared, blankly. Axel felt a twisted grin come back to his face as Saix processed the evidence in front of him.

"…does this have anything to do with a grudge against any certain decision of your superiors, Demyx?" Saix asked with his voice low and dangerous. Demyx, eyes wide, shook his head desperately. "N-no!" He exclaimed, "It was only a game, Saix, just a stupid game, and-"

"I dared him to do it!" Roxas piped in, oddly cheerful.

That sealed the deal, and they all knew it. If Roxas was the source of this, then some of the punishment would have fallen to him. Of course, Axel knew that Xemnas would have ordered Saix to not lay a hand on their precious Keyblade wielder, which meant Demyx was as good as Dusked. Axel waited for the slacker's death sentence, while Demyx held his breath. Saix opened his mouth to say something...

"Well, I'll just have to stay and play to keep an eye on you four, then."

The world was having a fun time screwing with Axel's expectations today.

Saix caught the look on Axel's face and shrugged, "What? We don't exactly have anything else to do. We're grounded until the storm passes."

Saix sat down and closed the gap between Axel himself and Luxord. Demyx relaxed and let out his breath in a relieved sigh, which Saix heard. He snapped his head up and glared at Demyx like a wolf eying its prey. "Oh, you're not off the hook, No. 9. We have a new world on the map, and since you just love recon duty..."

"What... kind of world?" Demyx whimpered.

"We don't know yet," said Saix, a very nice slasher smile growing on his face, "but we've heard reports of _very_ large wolves."

"Hey Saix," said Axel, "As hilarious as this is, it's my turn."

Saix looked at him; his smile, very pointedly, did not reach his cold yellow eyes, but for a moment it was like they were sixteen again, and back home in Radiant Garden...

"Alright, Demyx," said Axel, spurred on, "truth or _dare_?"

"Truth," Demyx muttered nervously, eyes flicking between Axel and Saix.

"After Larxene joined the Organization," Axel began, his trademarked evil smile returning to his lips, "somebody pulled a lot of practical jokes on our senior members. Was it you?"

Demyx tensed, "Well..." He started, "I... It was..."

"You can't lie, Demyx," Saix said. Demyx quailed under the combined glare of Radiant Garden's Terrible Two.

"It- it was me..." Demyx stuttered, then added, "B-but setting the Godzilla Heartless and giant gorilla Heartless loose was Larxene's idea, I swear!"

Saix and Axel shared a look – well, they'd found the culprit for _that_ incident, and they'd have to make a mental note of Larxene's malicious little "idea" (it was, after all, the reason the Castle That Never Was now floated several hundred feet above the ground). Demyx quickly turned to Luxord, who'd been looking quite bored for the past few minutes. "Alright, Luxord, truth or dare?"

"Might as well be truth, then," Luxord sighed.

"Okay... are you a virgin?"

It seemed to Axel that Demyx was having some bizarre focus on these things tonight. As he'd expected, Roxas gave him another tap on the arm.

"Axel, what's-"

"I'll tell you when you're older," Axel dismissed him, to Roxas's protests, as the others burst out laughing and Luxord answered, "Really now, what woman wouldn't want some of this? Except for Larxene, of course..."

"So the answer is?" Demyx pressed.

"No, not for ages now," Luxord finished.

"Really, now," Said the second unexpected voice of the night. They all jumped, as Xigbar suddenly dropped from the ceiling into their midst, "what are you, a bunch of schoolgirls? As if!"

Saix rolled his eyes at Xigbar's shoehorning of the catchphrase. "Then, if you are the adult here, Xigbar, would you care to bring some maturity to our game?" He asked, more than a little sarcastically.

Xigbar answered by sitting down between Roxas and Demyx with a smile and a meaningful look at Saix. Axel was surprised; Saix had meant that as a joke.

Luxord then turned attention back to the game by clearing his throat and asking, "Saix, truth or dare?"

"Let's make it a dare." Saix said.

"Right..." Luxord thought out loud, "...sing something."

Axel had to stifle a laugh. Then there was silence for a moment, and…

"What?" Saix asked.

"You heard me," Luxord replied, "Sing something. Anything."

Saix took a breath that might've been out of either exasperation or nerves, and stood up, pacing around like he was trying to remember something.

Saix and Axel had had a band for a very short time back in Radiant Garden, Axel remembered. He'd always been the better singer, but Saix had been good with a couple of tunes. Most of them being about wolves or the moon, but there was one annoying little J-pop song that came off a show about digital monsters, or something, that Saix had enjoyed bugging him with.

"Well?" Luxord prompted, as subtle way of asking Saix to get on with it.

"I'm trying to remember how it started..." Saix murmured, his eyes closed and his index finger making a tapping motion, like he was timing a beat.

Axel found himself trying to recall how that exact song began as well... it was loud, that was for sure, and energetic...

Saix was wordlessly mouthing the first few words, then after a moment put his voice behind them.

"_Mikake dake ja wakaranai yo daremo  
__Sugao nante misetakunai sa  
__Kimi to ore wa yoku niteru yo soko ga  
__Gokai sareru koto yoku aru ne..."_

Axel tilted his head to the side. It had sounded better when they were younger, he thought... and when there was a guitar behind the lyrics.

"_...Kuuru na furi shiteru kimi wo mite iru to  
__Kegawa kabutta mama no ore wo miteru mitai dakedo  
__Daijobu ore ga shitteru kimi no koto wo  
__Dakara heiki dakara heiki  
__Oretachi wa nakama sa da yo ne  
__Daijobu kimi mo shitteru ore no koto wo  
__Dakara heiki dakara heiki  
__Oretachi wa tsuyoku naru..."_

Roxas was clearly trying to make sense of the words. The kid probably didn't know Japanese – at all – but odds were Saix's garbled rendition of the song would still lodge itself into Roxas's brain and stay there, despite whatever he tried.

"_...Tsuno mo kiba mo honmono da yo dakedo  
__Tsukaikata ga mada heta nan da  
__Kimi wo nosete kaze no you ni hashiru toki  
__Donna tooi toko mo ikeru you na ki ga suru kara..."_

Demyx was bouncing in time with beat, like he was trying to commit the tune to memory so he could run a search on it once the internet was back up. He might've actually known the song, being the resident music nut.

"_...Daijobu aoi honoo de kimi wo mamoru  
__Dakara heiki dakara heiki  
__Issho ni tatakau yo itsumo  
__Daijobu tatoe donna ni shinka shitemo  
__Kimi no tame ni kimi no soba ni  
__Ore wa iru, yakusoku sa  
__Kuuru na furi shiteru kimi wo mite iru to  
__Kegawa kabutta mama no ore wo miteru mitai dakedo_  
_Daijobu ore ga shitteru kimi no koto wo  
__Dakara heiki dakara heiki  
__Oretachi wa nakama sa da yo ne  
__Daijobu kimi mo shitteru ore no koto wo  
__Dakara heiki dakara heiki  
__Oretachi wa tsuyoku naru..."_

Saix stopped singing and sat back down. Demyx clapped wildly, and Roxas followed suit. Axel gave Saix a thumbs-up. For not having sung the song in who knew how many years, it hadn't been half bad.

Saix looked over at Xigbar, addressing him, "Truth or Dare?"

"Dare," Xigbar said bravely.

"Do the Thriller dance on the ceiling."

* * *

Some time later...

Axel walked through the halls of the Castle, looking for Demyx, intending to pay him back for that stupid 'effing dare; he could still feel Roxas's lips on his, and the very thought of the kiss made his face burn. Oh, he was going to get Demyx good for_ that_ one...

Axel found the Melodious Nocturne together with Luxord in the hallway, both stifling laughter over something Axel couldn't see. Quietly, he lightened his footsteps and silently crept up behind his targets. With the pair of Nobodies completely unaware that Axel was behind them, Axel could see right over Demyx's shoulder... to the screen of the video camera Demyx was holding.

"This is so awesome!" Demyx snickered, "They don't even realize anything's going on! Luxord, you are amazing!"

Luxord smiled appreciatively. "I try," he replied.

Axel felt his jaw tighten when he realized they'd somehow managed to get video footage of the kiss – and according to the display, the video had lasted well over seven minutes, not just the five that Demyx had originally proposed, with thirty seconds left to go in the video. Time manipulation; this was Luxord's doing.

"What music should we put over this?" Asked Demyx, as the video of the kiss ended with Saix barging in and Axel and Roxas springing apart as though electrocuted, "I'm thinking death metal, since it's gotta be unfitting."

"That would work." Luxord shrugged, "But you're the expert on music; I'll leave it up to you."

"Yeah, but Saix and Xigbar's stuff was a great bonus. I can put to the instrumentals behind Saix's singing and everything-" Demyx stopped dead as Axel tapped him on the shoulder.

"Hi there," Axel said, loudly, and enjoying the sight of Demyx turning pale and Luxord jumping about a foot in the air, "How'd you manage to sneak that camera past us?"

Instead of answering, the two looked like they were about ready to make a run for it. Luxord was already backing into a Dark Corridor when Axel lunged and grabbed them both, hard, by the wrists.

"That was a nice try," Axel said, mockingly, and giving them another trademarked chilling Axel-grin, "But you have wake up earlier than that to pull a fast one on me." Axel gave the arm in which Demyx held the video camera a tight squeeze, making him whimper and drop the it. Quickly, Axel, released his captives, scooped the camera with its blackmail material, and backed away, his targets stunned for the moment. Axel then raised a hand, like he was going to snap his fingers...

The trick worked, and both Luxord and Demyx did run this time. Axel let them, snapped his fingers and let the flames roar into being once they were a few feet away.

The burns wouldn't kill them, of course. Axel would get in trouble if he killed them. He just kept enough control over the fire to leave them alive, but of course, they'd be burned in some very delicate places, places that would sting for a long while...

_

* * *

__...and Axel still denies the whole "kiss" thing ever happened. Xion laughed for about an hour straight when I told her the story. That and, I've done research, and apparently kissing _is_ done when two people really, really like each other. Well, Axel is my best friend, right? We like each other..._ _Anyway, the night just got weirder from there. But it leads to the story of how I discovered what my attribute is..._

* * *

**And that is the only AkuRoku borderline romance you are ever going to get out of me. Ever. It's only friendshippy fluff from here on out. :P ****And yes, the song Saix is singing is real, and it's from Digimon, and it's Gabumon's character song, "Daijobu." ****The underlying joke behind it is that Saix and Gabumon have the same English voice actor, Kirk Thorton.**

**I hope your brains just exploded upon reading that.**


	3. The Storm, Pt 2

_**of Super Smash Brothers Brawl**_** that includes Nanoha **

**Takamachi as a playable character. And it is awesome. **

**

* * *

**_So, all that day, the storm made sure that the portals in and out of The World That Never Was didn't work. But, later, it started raining and stuff even harder and the portals _within_ Never Was stoppe__d working. So, unless you were Xigbar you couldn't warp from place to place, so we were all forced to walk instead of warping, which wasn't so bad, except then the power went out._

Ah, Roxas. So innocent, so easy to manipulate... Anyway, I remain convinced that somewhere, in all the worlds, there is a version

Unseen Days: Chapter 3

The Storm, Part 2

* * *

"_Time!" _The announcer's voice called, _"Nanoha wins!"_

The character onscreen then went through the typical victory poses while the players' stats displayed. Axel, meanwhile, was close to throwing the Wii-mote through the television screen.

"How do you keep beating me?" Axel demanded. Roxas gave him a cheeky grin.

"Natural talent?" Roxas answered, smugly.

"You've been mashing buttons the past four matches! And you keep spamming the cheapest move in the game!"

"Hey, how is Starlight Breaker cheap? You need a Smash Orb to use it!"

"Not that kind of cheap-" Axel trailed off. He kept forgetting that Roxas was still picking up the Super Smash Brothers jargon that had become like a second language to half the Organization since Xigbar brought the game home. "Roxas, Starlight Breaker kills everything onscreen!"

"I know, right? It's awesome!"

Axel growled, frustrated. "Alright," He said, pressing the button that brought them back to the character selection screen, "Rematch time. And stop using Starlight Breaker!"

* * *

Never before had target practice involved pop music.

"_'Cause this is thriller!_" Xigbar sang, as he blasted Dusks with his arrow guns, "_Thriller ni-ight! And no one's gonna save you from the thing forty ey-eyes!_"

* * *

Meanwhile, in the expansive, plot-convenient halls of the Castle, Larxene trailed behind the newest member of their order. She was a little curious about Xion: two and a half weeks already, and all the mysterious individual had done was skulk around the castle, hooded and silent.

"Hey, newbie!" Larxene called. Xion stopped and turned around to face her. "Why're you so quiet all the time?"

Xion stayed quiet. Larxene stepped closer, until the two of them were almost face-to-face, barring height differences. "I don't think I've ever heard you talk, ever!"

No response. Just a blank stare from eyes you couldn't see.

"And your hood's up all the time," Larxene continued, becoming thoroughly annoyed by the silence, "I don't even know if you're a boy or a girl!"

No reaction. "What're you hiding under there?" Larxene murmured.

The two were so close, and it was the perfect opportunity. She couldn't resist. Larxene's hand snuck up behind Xion's head and wrenched the hood down...

And it was at that exact moment that the power went out.

* * *

"Oh, come on!" Axel shouted as the TV screen winked out, "I was winning!"

Roxas stared around blindly in the darkness. "What just happened?" He asked.

"Power outage," Axel grumbled, not bothering to explain further. He snapped his fingers, allowing a small, wavering flame to appear over his index finger, providing a faint, warm light. "C'mon. It's standard procedure to report to the Round Room when this happens." Axel started off down the hallways.

Roxas pursued him, following the light. "But isn't it still flooded?" He asked.

Axel stopped, and swore much louder than was necessary.

* * *

Larxene was also inadvertantly teaching Xion a number of very inappropriate new words in the seconds after the blackout hit. The new member backed away, out of Larxene's grasp, and suddenly made a high-pitched squeak, preceded by a dull thump.

Okay, Larxene concluded, high voice. Either_ she_ is a girl, or puberty will soon hit _him_ like a train.

"Who goes there?" Ask a voice from the darkness. It was a soft, rich, masculine voice, and the scent of rose petals accompanied it. Must be that flower loving freak, Marluxia.

"It's me," Larxene said. "And you just bumped into Xion there."

"Ah," Marluxia replied, "The latest addition to our ranks. I don't believe we've ever spoken properly. I am Marluxia." Larxene rolled her eyes. Marly could be so effing dramatic... "These are quite unusual circumstances we've met under, aren't they?"

Silence.

"Don't expect her to answer." Larxene told Marluxia, annoyed.

As her eyes adjusted, Larxene could just make out the faint silhouette of Marluxia putting a hand on Xion's shoulder. "Well," he said, "I'm sure she'll speak up when she feels like it. But, right now, we should head to the Round Room."

"I know, I know." Larxene grumbled, "Standard procedure,"

Larxene set off down the halls, feeling along the walls to navigate, the footfalls of Marluxia and Xion behind her the only sounds she could hear.

* * *

"What a time for the power to go out..." Vexen mumbled, while Luxord and Demyx fidgeted on the cold stainless steel table of his laboratory, cool aloe gel smeared all over their inner thighs and more delicate areas; these areas were currently scorched and blistering, as a result of Axel's payback for their attempted blackmail.

"Should we... head up to the Round Room?" Demyx asked, slowly, "There's still all that water in there..."

Vexen looked up from whatever he was working with. "Water?" He inquired, "What water?"

"I... kind of flooded the Round Room on a dare." Demyx answered, shyly. Vexen sighed, exasperated.

"I swear, all you neophytes..." He grumbled. The Chilly Academic then went back to shifting things about in the darkness, muttering darkly.

"Wait," Luxord said, slowly, "You didn't know about the Round Room?"

"Obviously not," Vexen said, "Ah, here we go...!" He exclaimed suddenly, as he found whatever he was looking for.

"But... could that mean that no one else knows about how the Round Room is full of water?"

Demyx gasped. Luxord couldn't see his face, but he could hear the panic in Demyx's voice as he put it together, "Wait," Demyx said, "if they don't know about the water... if any one of them opens the doors..."

Luxord realized where Demyx was going with this. "We need to get up there." He said, urgently, sliding off the table and feeling his way through the dark. Demyx followed after him.

"Right..." Demyx said, "One minute, I have to find my pants."

Luxord stopped and turned back to the dark of the lab. "That..." He started, "is probably a good idea."

* * *

"It's dark."

"Wonderful observation, Roxas."

Axel lead the younger Nobody through the Castle, walking fast. Full of water or not, he was still headed to the Round Room. He had to set a good example, after all...

"Wait up!" Roxas called as Axel rounded a corner, taking their small, improvised torch with him.

Axel stopped and waited for Roxas to catch up. He sighed and, in the interest of not leaving his charge behind in the dark, grabbed Roxas's hand (and tried very hard not to think about what Demyx would say if he saw this, after the Truth or Dare fiasco…). "C'mon," Axel said patiently, and the two set off at a brisk walk again.

_I curse the day they designed this place,_ Axel thought. All these twisting hallways and long corridors did _not_ make for good emergency procedures. Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the pair of them met up with someone else.

"Hey," Larxene barked from the dark end of whatever endless corridor they were currently wandering down, "hold up a minute!"

Axel turned and watched the Savage Nymph emerge from the shadows, followed by the Marluxia, the Graceful Assassin and Xion, the... Xion, the new member, who, as always, was staring blankly at nothing.

"Headed to the Round Room?" Axel asked.

"No duh," Larxene shot back, rolling her eyes.

"Yeah, well," Axel retorted, "don't get your hopes up. Demyx flooded the place. Without the Dark Corridors, no one can get in... or out."

* * *

Meanwhile, in the Round Room...

"So..." Xemnas said slowly, "...we seem to be stuck."

"Indeed," Saix said tensely, curled up with his knees nearly touching his chin to avoid getting soaked by the water inches below his seat, reminding himself to find Demyx later and lynch him.

* * *

Larxene seemed to mull Axel's declaration over for a minute, then strode forward, grabbing Axel's other hand and dragging him off. "Come on," She told him, "I'm going to fix the breaker."

Axel released his grip on Roxas, and tried to fight off Larxene.

"Why am I coming with you?" He demanded.

"Because I need the light, obviously." Larxene snapped back.

Axel turned around for a minute to look back at Roxas. "Hey," he called, "stay with Marluxia and Xion! I'll be back later! If you get to the Round Room, wait outside, and _make sure no one opens the door__!_"

"Okay!" Roxas answered. The tiny torch got smaller and smaller as Axel and Larxene walked away, until it was gone, leaving the other three Nobodies in darkness. He looked at Marluxia and Xion. "So..." He asked, slowly, "What now?"

* * *

"Where's that flashlight?" Zexion shouted, blindly rummaging through the drawer in the library. His other hand held a book, a book he was _so very close_ to finishing, with one finger stuck between the pages, since Zexion had misplaced his bookmark and dog-earring the page was a criminal offense to him.

"I think," Lexaeus said from somewhere behind him, "I saw Vexen with it."

"What does he need with a flashlight?" Zexion asked, "He has his own generator down in the lab!"

Lexaeus chose to ignore Zexion's lapse in logical thinking for now; the boy was quite restless at the moment, and probably would continue to be so until he could resume reading and discover the Half-Blood Prince's true identity.

* * *

"I'm glad Vexen had this flashlight," Demyx panted.

"Be quiet and run!" Luxord chastised, "Save your oxygen!"

And the two charged through the halls up to the Round Room.

* * *

Xaldin stared at the blank computer screen.

_When was the last time I clicked save?_ He wondered, then sighed and head up towards the Round Room. His Buffy fan fiction would have to wait...

* * *

Axel, meanwhile, was still being dragged through the dark bowels of the castle.

"Ever wonder why we have all this space?" He asked no one in particular, "It's only fourteen of us, after all." Larxene stayed silent, preferring to respond with a zap, like a bad static jolt, to the hand she still had a death grip on. Axel jumped and tried, again in vain, to struggle out her grasp. Unable to escape, he resorted instead to his trademarked snarkiness.

"Ow," He said, in a total deadpan.

"Oh, stop whining, baby." Larxene snapped back.

"Baby?" Axel asked playfully, taking advantage of her choice of words. "Larxene, you really think of me like that?"

Larxene chose not to grace him with a death glare, still preferring to give Axel another shock to the hand.

* * *

"So, there I am, standing on the edge of the stage, when Axel – and Axel's playing as Kirby – whacks my character and knocks the Smash Orb right out of me!"

Roxas was rambling, panic slowly edging its way into his voice. Xion didn't blame him; she didn't like the dark much either.

"That's quite normal," said the voice in front of her, whose face she couldn't quite remember. Marluxia, was that his name? "You know, it would be prudent to stop relying on your character's finishing move so much. What if you were in a match with items disabled?"

"You can do that?" Roxas asked.

Xion listened, not saying a word. This talk of Smash Orbs, characters and stages had something to do with a game they liked to play, didn't it?

Roxas kept talking to stave off hysteria. Xion listened, keeping silent. Maybe, some day, she could play that game with him.

* * *

"Will anyone even show up with the Round Room like this?" Xigbar asked, looking in Six's general direction; he couldn't pinpoint his face in the dark.

The Luna Diviner's voice responded from the darkness; "We don't even know if anyone else knows it's flooded."

Silence.

"So... should someone go outside and check?" Xigbar asked again, feigning stupidity to get a reaction out of Saix. It worked.

"Yes," Saix said, tensely. Xigbar could just picture him with his jaw locked and fingers clawing the sides of his seat, "someone with the ability to warp _in and out_, an ability that is unaffected by our weather predicament, should _go and check_."

"Him," Xigbar teased, "where could we find a person like that?"

Was it his imagination, or were Saix's eyes glowing yellow with seething rage?

"Alright, alright. I'll go check." Xigbar warped out of the Round Room, peaking his head out of the void and into the hall outside the blocked door. Sure enough, it was deserted.

Xigbar warped again, slumping into his seat. "Nope," he reported, "No one out there."

Then, in a sudden stroke of inspiration, Xigbar started stripping down, and dove into the dark water, being careful to make as big a splash, as close to Saix, as was possible.

"Xigbar!" Saix snapped, "What are you doing?"

"Making the most of our new pool." Xigbar answered, swimming over to Saix, again being careful to displace as much water he could. "Come on in, the water's fine!"

Saix seemed to consider it for a moment. "You... wouldn't happen to be naked, would you?"

"Yes."

"Then no. _Hell_ no."

* * *

"Hey, Luxord?" Demyx asked, while they stopped to catch their breath, just for a moment.

"Hm?" Luxord said, managing to keep some of his trademarked composure despite his exhaustion and burning lungs.

"Why... don't you..." Demyx stopped for another gulp of air. "Why don't you just travel back in time and stop me from flooding the Round Room?"

"Well, Demyx, the short answer is that if I put a stop to your crazy schemes every time it was turned out to be slightly inconvenient for you," Pause, deep breath, "The space-time continuum would be a mess."

Demyx seemed satisfied with that answer. He picked up the flashlight again and they set off once more.

_That,_ Luxord added to himself, _and it__'s much for fun when it's a gamble like this._

The flashlight flickered for a moment. Demyx shook it to get the light going again.

"Just a few more floors now," Luxord heard him say under his breath, "C'mon, we can make it!"

The light then went out completely. Demyx started swearing loudly, before Luxord heard his footsteps rapidly advancing on, regardless of both of them being practically blind.

"I am not going to go on extra combat missions for this!" Demyx shouted. Luxord had to hand it to him, Demyx could be quite determined... when he wanted to be.

* * *

"...and that's how I found out what 'making out' is." Roxas finished, still feeling along the wall to find his way. Oddly enough, unlike with his personal anecdotes on adventures in Twilight Town, the odd things the rest of the Organization enjoyed doing (with special attention focused on the odd, slightly sticky disc that he had found in the computer lab, in a locked drawer, labeled "Zexion only"), and the finer points of his personal Super Smash Brothers strategy (most of it being "kill everything with a Starlight Breaker"), Marluxia didn't seem to be willing to give comments on his newest escapade.

"Marluxia?" Roxas called, wondering where the older Nobody had gone. Silence greeted him as he turned around, blindly sticking out a hand in hopes of finding something.

Well, or someone. Roxas's hand brushed against the black leather of another Organization coat; it was a reassuring sign that he wasn't totally alone in the dark.

"Hey," Roxas said, the greeting coming out like a sigh of relief, "Uh, Xion, is that you?"

No reply. Given Xion's usual nature, Roxas took that to mean "yes."

"You were following me this whole time?"

Still no reply.

"Well... um, let's head to the Round Room, then."

Roxas felt for the wall again, using it and his (admittedly foggy) memories of the castle's layout to try and navigate to the flooded meeting room. He walked on, turning his head every few minutes to see if Xion was still behind him – then remembering he could barely see anything and looking ahead again, only for him to _then_ remember that he couldn't even see the path. Eventually, he just shut his eyes and tried to imagine the halls were brightly lit again, using that picture and his (still admittedly foggy) recollections to hopefully not get them both completely lost.

"If only we had a _light,_" Roxas moaned, as he seemed to, indeed, be getting them hopelessly lost.

_I wish I could be like Axel_, he thought, _and I could snap my fingers and make a little fire..._

Experimentally, Roxas snapped his own fingers in front of him, willing something, anything to happen. Instead of fire, his Keyblade appeared in a flash of pure white light, illuminating the dark hall for an instant before landing on the ground with a loud clattering noise.

"Wait a sec..." Roxas realized, picking up his Keyblade and dismissing it. A smaller flash of light lit up the darkness. Again, he willed the weapon to his hand, this time examining his surroundings in the brief space of time in which he could see them.

"I know where we are..." Roxas said. Dismissing the Keyblade once more, just to make sure, he looked over his shoulder to his silent companion, "Follow me, Xion!"

And they went off again, the erratic light of summoning and dismissing the Kingdom Key showing them the way.

* * *

"Roxas, you've been awfully quiet. Are you alright back there?"

Marluxia turned around; even with his eyes adjusted, he couldn't see any diminutive figures following him.

"Roxas?" He called again. The boy didn't answer; Marluxia had somehow lost him.

"Oh dear... Axel's going to kill me for this."

* * *

"Hey, here's the fuse box."

"Thanks for that, Captain Obvious."

"You're welcome, Bitch Queen."

Axel's poking fun had turned into this trade of insults in the last few minutes, the two of them snarking back and forth while Axel tried not to melt any of the delicate wires; everything in the castle seemed to be hooked up to one massive fuse box, brightly colored cables crisscrossing haphazardly before disappearing underneath the metal cube. It seemed to be a massive fire hazard, and a disaster waiting to happen. Ignoring this, Larxene got to work, her powers over electricity allowing her to sense… _something_ about the circuits throughout the castle. Hell if Axel knew any details about it.

"Keep the light close," She told Axel. He held his ground.

"Open flame here," Axel reminded her; he'd rather not set all this on fire.

Larxene ignored his caution and yanked him closer. She continued messing with the switches, occasionally whipping out a kunai to get at the copper behind the insulation on the wires; Axel saw sparks jump from her fingers when she did this.

"What're you doing?" Axel finally asked, just a bit curious.

"Trying to find out where we've been cut off," Larxene answered, rolling her eyes. "The transformer's shot." She added.

"Okay..." Axel trailed off, not really wanting her to go into specifics; Larxene did anyway.

"Basically, we just need two or three of your little minions to go fix it. Most likely, something got fried, so..."

And so on. On the upside, Axel did learn a lot about the castle's electrical system that day.

* * *

"Here's one!"

Zexion tried the switch on the flashlight to make sure it worked, and shined it at the pages of his book to ensure the beam was bright enough.

"Perfect..." he murmured, before changing direction and heading towards the Round Room, his nose buried in the tome as he walked. Lexaeus kept pace with Zexion, occasionally directing the younger man away from the walls he would've otherwise run into.

* * *

Flash.

"This way!"

Flash.

"A little further!"

Flash.

"Um..."

Flash.

"Uh-oh..."

Flash.

"I think we're lost, Xion."

Roxas curled his hand around the shape of a handle, willing the his Keyblade to his grip again. As nice as it was to have a light, the brief flashes made it unreliable. Now, if only he could make the flashes last longer...

"Maybe there's some kind of spell for light." Roxas reasoned, recalling his Fire and Lightning spells, "And you have to say something related to light to cast it!" After all, you _did_ have to say "Fire" for Fire, and "Lightning" for Lightning.

Roxas whipped his weapon out in front of him, focusing as hard as he could on the white flash that appeared whenever he brought it to his hand. "Light!" He called.

Nothing happened. Determined, Roxas waved the Kingdom Key around and tried again, "Light the way!" But the space around them stayed a stubborn, unlit inky black.

Frustrated now, Roxas kept trying with every invocation he could think of. He thought he felt a faint tingle of power in _Salvation,_ and _Spell Weaver_, but when he tried conjuring giant pink beams of doom with _Divine Shooter_ and _Starlight Breaker_, nothing happened (in hindsight, this may have been a good thing; after all, he probably would've blown some pretty big holes in the castle if he did manage to cast a Starlight Breaker).

"I guess this is why it's hard to just make up new magic spells..." Roxas started to say, through clenched teeth, while keeping a picture of a blinding light firmly in his mind's eye. but stopped when the word "magic" made a faint white spark at the tip of the Kingdom Key.

"Magic..." Roxas said again, as the bright wall in his mind solidified and the spark came back, "Magic... Magic, magic, magic!" And with every word the light became even more blinding. Finally, as the Keyblade became a sparkler in his hands, Roxas found the words, as though they had been sitting in his mind and waiting for him to come across them. "Magic Hour!"

A sharp, pure shaft of light shot from the Keyblade. It light up the hallway like a glorious lightning bolt, transforming the two young Nobodies into lone sentinels, and their shadows became ominous columns for an instant, before it faded, leaving Roxas seeing spots.

"Whoa..." Roxas breathed. "Did you see that, Xion?" No reply from the new member. "What was that?" Again; no response, but Roxas didn't expect one that time.

Already eager to try again, Roxas held out the Keyblade again, thinking of light. But before he could even say the words, a pillar of light shot out of the ground. Fascinated, Roxas held out a hand, focusing in on the sensation of that pure power, and a blinding ball of light appeared in his hand.

This wasn't quite like any magic he'd ever used, Roxas thought, as he let the light go out. Rubbing his eyes, which had started stinging when he'd cast the harsh light, Roxas remembered how casting magic took a moment of sharp concentration, scraped together off the surface of his being. This new magic ran deeper… it was more instinctual, and as Roxas held his hand back out, he found that he could bring the light back with barely a thought.

"Is this…?" he wondered aloud, recalling how Axel had talked to Saix about finding Roxas's… something or other, which Axel told him was a kind of power unique to them, which took a specific form depending on the Nobody. "Is this my power?"

Roxas smiled, feeling some kind of warm glow in his chest, like the sun on his face. All of Axel's badgering about it and Roxas had found it all on his own…

Thinking of how Axel could command his own power and channel it, in the form of either a roaring inferno or a tiny candle, Roxas tried focusing his power into smaller point; he called the bright ball of light again, but thought about packing it into a tighter space…

Roxas gave the command. This time, instead of a beam or a ball brighter than Twilight Town's sun, the light became a little, tiny sphere, floating in front of them and providing a very bright source of illumination for something so small.

"Xion," Roxas said, still smiling, "I know the way from here! Follow me!" The orb of light bounced a little, like it was responding him, and floated off, showing them the way.

Roxas and Xion pursued the light for a while, coming close to the Round Room, until they came near a stairwell to one of the lower levels. Something suddenly came charging up from the dark; Roxas had his Keyblade back in his hands before he'd realized it. However, it became clear that whatever had jumped them wasn't a threat when it missed both Xion and Roxas and crashed into the wall behind them.

"Demyx?" Roxas asked, as the Nobody in question peeled himself off the wall, disorientated but seemingly unharmed.

"He-ey Roxas!" Demyx replied, stumbling around a bit; his speech was slurred too. So much for "unharmed". "I was just heading up to the Round Room 'n'-" He suddenly stopped and shook his head violently. "Ow..." Demyx muttered, holding his head in his hands.

"You alright?" Roxas asked.

"It's nothing," Demyx said, rapidly regaining his senses, "Nothing compared to what Saix'll do to me if I don't get up there!" Then he saw the little light.

"...Where'd this come from?" Demyx asked, prodding the glowing orb.

"That's our flashlight." Roxas answered, "I made it." He added proudly.

"Made it? Like... with your attribute?"

"Yeah! Mine's light!"

Demyx looked to Roxas, then to the light. "Can I borrow this?" He asked, pointing at it.

"I'll just come with you. It follows me, I think."

Then they were off again, with Xion trailing behind them. Luxord got to the top of the staircase moments later, just as the light was fading.

"Demyx," He panted, thinking out loud, "can move very fast when he wants to."

* * *

"Are we positive no one's coming?" Saix asked, still curled up in his seat. He was starting to cramp up from being in this position for so long... but, to him, it was infinitely preferable to accidently brushing up against (Saix shuddered at the thought) a nude Xigbar.

"Hang on," said the skinny-dipper in question, "I'll go check it out."

Saix heard a faint "vhreen" noise of Xigbar's teleportation, followed by the splash of water displacing itself. Honestly, he didn't know what freaked him out more; seeing Xigbar naked or the fact that their superior hadn't said a word throughout all of this.

* * *

Zexion looked up from his book just in time to see a shadow appear briefly outside the doors of the Round Room, then disappear again.

"…am I hallucinating, or did I just see Xigbar naked?" He asked, then added, "Never mind, don't answer that."

Lexaeus stayed silent as they went for the doors, Zexion mumbling about Xigbar being too lazy to just _walk_ to their meeting room. Though, try as they might, when Zexion attempted to open the door, he found it was stuck.

_What on earth?_ Zexion thought, tugging fruitlessly at the large handles.

"Allow me," Lexaeus said. Zexion backed away as Lexaeus took the door handle and pulled, harder and harder, until with a snap of the wood, the handle came away from the door.

"This is more than a simple lock." Lexaeus stated, "Some magic is in place here."

"For some kind of prank, I'd guess." Zexion said, "Probably Demyx's work."

* * *

"A bubble?" Roxas asked, "It's just a bubble around the doors?"

"Yes," Demyx said, as they ran to keep up with the little ball of light, "You'd be amazed what surface tension can do."

* * *

Quite curiously, Xaldin found Zexion and Lexaeus not in the Round Room, but standing outside, looking through Zexion's lexicon, with one of the door handles broken off and on the floor.

"…what?" He said. The pair in front of him looked up.

"Door's stuck," Zexion said, simply.

* * *

"There, that should do it," Larxene said, closing the panel the covered the generator's inner workings.

"So, will the light's be back on soon?" Axel asked, tired of having to be Larxene's flashlight.

"Of course, idiot, it takes a moment to boot back up."

"Oh so testy, aren't we?"

"Shut up!"

* * *

_Not getting extra work for this not getting extra work for this I AM NOT GETTING EXTRA WORK FOR THIS_, Demyx said over and over in his head as he skidded around the corner, using one final burst of energy for the last stretch the meeting room. Roxas wasn't far behind.

"_STOP!_" Demyx shouted as he registered three figured standing in front of the doorway, "_DON'T OP__EN THAT DOOR!_"

* * *

"You sure this'll work?" Zexion asked, as Xaldin slid the razor edge of one of his spears into the slot between the doors.

"No, but it works in movies, and we don't have many other ideas right now."

"You are aware it's a magic lock, right?" Lexaeus pointed out.

As he said it, Xaldin felt some kind of resistance give away. Dismissing his weapon, Xaldin stepped back to give Lexaeus room. "Try it now," he said.

Lexaeus grasped the one remaining door handle and pulled hard, just as Demyx came around the corner, shouting his warning a moment too late. The doors opened easy… bringing thousands of gallons of water with it. Just as the water came flooding out, the lights flickered on, bringing stark light back to the halls… and electricity to the exposed sockets.

And thus, all present were barbequed.

* * *

Vexen came up to the hall where the Round Room lay. Roxas, along with Xion, were watching, transfixed, at the edge of a very large puddle.

"…is something burning?" Vexen inquired, sniffing at the air.

"No, but Demyx, Zexion, Xigbar and Lexaeus just got zapped. Oh, and Xigbar's naked for some reason." Roxas answered, a tad too cheerily.

"Er… right," Vexen, wondering if the boy and his little project had had the misfortune of seeing Xigbar's unmentionables yet, turned the two away and nudged Roxas off, "Go… go find… headlighter fluid in the kitchen, we'll need it to get them fixed up."

"Alright!" Roxas chirped, running off; Xion followed him.

With innocent eyes no longer around to be tarnished by the sight of a naked Xigbar, Vexen approached the mess; any initial thoughts of fatalities were chased away by subtle signs of movement amongst the victims."What happened?" He asked, angrily, "Demyx, is this your doing?"

Proving himself much more durable than one would initially guess, Demyx picked himself up off the floor, staring pitifully up at his superior. "Flooding the Round Room, yes." He then indicated the massive puddle "This? No." He was putting on the best puppy dog face he could. "I didn't open the doors. Please don't hurt me!"

"…right." Vexen then turned away from the pathetic sight, and towards Xigbar, who was coming around and starting to laugh like a drunken idiot. Vexen sighed, exasperated; _you'd think No. II would have more__ dignity than this…_

"Xigbar… why?" Vexen asked, "Just… just why?"

* * *

Some time later, Axel made his way back up to the upper levels, glad to be free of Larxene's company, when Xaldin walked by. Axel did a double take, then choked back laughter at the sight of Xaldin's dreadlocks all standing on end, like he'd stuck a fork in an electrical socket.

"Nice hairdo," Axel commented, then deftly dodged the spear that was thrown his way.

* * *

_That was a weird night. But I talked to Axel afterwards, and __apparently__ lig__ht _really_ is my attribute! I wonder what Xion's is…? _

__

* * *

**Adlfkldkcfmdckdjfkadjmmcdkc. This one was a **_**mind-breaker.**_** Mostly because the "voices" of these characters when I go over this in my head are not those of the canon Org, but ****rather those of the fan-ma****de audio dramas from OrgLIX. And while hilarious they may be like that, it's very hard to keep them as close to canon as I would like, which is the entire point of this mini-series. x.x **

**Also, I confess to only knowing as much about electric systems and c****ircuit breakers and fuse boxes as 9****th**** grade physical science class taught me. And… I know surface tension can't really do **_**all**_** that… ehehehe… but it's comedy! Rule of funny, people! ^^; -is shot anyway- **

**I love the idea of having a Super Smash Brothers game from another world with different characters, though. Expect it to appear again. **

**Also, Zexion is, in fact, reading **_**Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.**_** There was supposed to be a joke about a certain spoiler in this chapter, but it never happened. ****Rest assured it will appear next time.**

**And Xaldin writes Buffy the Vampire Slayer ****fan fiction****. This is my attempt at giving him a personality. **


	4. Movie Night

**Wow, two chapters in one day? I guess this is my way of apologizing for lack of recent updates…**

**And here we have one of the very, very first **_**Unseen Days**_** plot ideas I ever came up with. I remember its creation well… it was a warm summer's day, and I was at camp. I'd made friends with some other anime fans there (hi guys!) and I remember discussing this with Adrian while playing capture the flag…**

**Ah, good times. Anywho, let the mental scarring of the Organization begin! **

**

* * *

**

* * *

_We had a really slow day today, so the three of us got back to the castle much sooner than normal. I said something about a movie, but Axel reminded us that he's not allowed in the Blockbuster That Never Was anymore. And that reminded me of the reason _why_ he's not allowed to rent movies any more; it was a while back, after Axel got back from Castle Oblivion…_

_

* * *

_

Unseen Days: Chapter 4

Movie Night

* * *

"Alright," Saix said, as Demyx reluctantly settled into a spot on the couch, "whose turn was it to pick the movie this month?"

"Mine," Axel said, holding up a DVD case, "Got it right here."

"Is this gonna take long?" Demyx whined, "I was right in the middle of reading something!"

Xaldin gave Demyx a very surprised look, turning to face him and quirking an eyebrow, "You?" He asked, "Reading something?"

"Yeah," Demyx said, huffily, "I was reading Zexion's Harry Potter books, since he's, y'know, dead. I was right in the middle of Half-Blood Prince!"

"I'll save your time," Saix said, as eager to be done with this as Demyx was, "Snape kills Dumbledore on page 596."

Demyx stared at Saix with a look of deadened shocked. Saix, on the other hand, calmly got up and took the movie from Axel.

"Axel… are you positive this fits the Superior's… perimeters?" He questioned, examining the front cover; it was a dramatic piece of work, featuring a pair of adolescents standing in front of the ocean… but then you noticed the water was blood red and there was half of a gargantuan, pale face staring back at both them _and you_.

"Oh, I'm sure its family-friendly." Axel assured him, "I found it in the kids section, across from _Elfen Lied_, underneath _Toy Story 3_, and right next to _Legend of the Overfiend_."

"You could've gotten _Toy Story 3_," Xemnas mused, "I remember seeing the first two with Ienzo. It left him scared of his teddy bear for a week."

Demyx and Axel laughed at that. Saix just made a face as he put the disc in the DVD player.

"Hey Axel," Roxas chimed in; he was curled up on the couch near Axel, with Xion smushed cozily in-between them, "Can we get _Toy Story 3_ next time?"

"Isn't it Demyx's turn to pick next time?" Xion pointed out. Axel nodded in assent.

"Oh, okay…" Sighed Roxas, "Maybe I'll find it when it's my turn to pick."

"What the heck is up with the DVD menu?" Demyx wondered aloud; his alarmed tone of voice turned their attention back to the TV screen.

"The letters are falling apart…" Luxord observed.

"To say nothing of the background." Xaldin pointed out, as a character behind the menu options let out a bloodcurdling shriek only to be abruptly cut off.

"Okay…" Axel said, sounding increasingly concerned, "Let's… just… play the movie…"

And things went downhill from there.

"I thought this was supposed to be animated…?" Demyx questioned, as several live action scenes played by, accompanied by Japanese lettering that several of them half-understood. The movie played through the opening credits, showing the names of sponsors, before finally cutting to something that Axel recognized as animation.

"Is the whole city flooded?" Demyx said, "Or am I looking in some sort of mirror?"

"Yes, exactly what is going here?" Xaldin agreed.

Without warning, the scene changed from a sundrenched, half-submerged wreck of a city to that of the two adolescents from the cover in a hospital room; a girl, unconscious and wired to several machines, and a boy, watching over her and begging her to wake up.

"Oh boy," Xigbar whistled, "Hey Axel, you might want to cover up the kids' eyes. Something tells me things are gonna get mushy in a second."

Had they had hearts, this probably would've been a very touching moment. It reminded Xion in particular of how Roxas had been unconscious for nearly a month after Axel had left for Castle Oblivion… at least until the girl's hospital gown fell op-

"Oh jeez!" Xigbar yelled, "The innocents! _Shield their eyes!_"

No sooner had he said than Axel had jumped in front of his younger friends and clamped both hands very firmly over their eyes. Roxas briefly fought back, pulling the "eye shield" off and attempting to glance around Axel before he had his sight blocked again.

Demyx, on the other hand, was squinting at the screen and wondering why it had suddenly switched to more innocuous visuals of the objects in the room. "What's he doing?" He asked, "Wait, is that glue all over his ha- oh, wait, that's not glue…"

"Damnit Axel!" Saix snapped, "They're called ratings! You check them for a _reason!_"

It got a bit better after that. It was still confusing, but at least it was appropriate enough that neither Saix nor Xemnas protested. It was mostly military types panicking over a mysterious invading force wanting something called an "Eva".

"Seven minutes in, and I'm lost." Luxord interjected. "What's an 'Eva'?"

A question they'd all been thinking. Xaldin waved it off. "Just… go with it." He said, "It'll be less painful if we don't question it."

A pause.

"Animation's decent." Xigbar added, "But the voiceovers need work."

Eight minutes in, and the secret base in the movie was on the alert.

"Didn't take them long to get to the action." Luxord noted, as the movie took a moment to introduce its second adult female character.

"It took even less time to get to the girls." Xigbar snickered.

"Oh, you know these kinds of shows. I'm willing to bet not one of them is over the age of twenty."

Roxas, on the other hand, was a bit more interested in the character of the faction's commander. "Hey look," He pointed out, "That commander guy is doing the same pose the Superior always does."

Axel and Xion looked over at Xemnas. Sure enough, his golden eyes were focused intently on the television screen, with hands clasped in front of his face. A perfect copy, sans orange-tinted, spooky, shiny sunglasses.

"This entire sequence needs musical accompaniment," Saix said. Demyx nodded, a historical moment in the Organization; that when the two of them actually agreed with each other. As animated, black-clad commandos stormed the heroes base, a dramatic score kicked up. Saix's lips twitched in a slight smile when he got his wish.

Demyx, on the other hand, shrank back into the couch as one of the guards in the beige uniforms was silently knifed in the back. _Oh man_, he thought, as the onscreen violence escalated, _why couldn't Axel have gotten Toy Story 3? _

Axel took initiative by covering Roxas and Xion's eyes again. Annoyed, they threw off the covers, only to immediately hide behind them again when it seemed somebody in the film had a real, bloody grudge against anyone in a light-colored uniform.

"'Hit 'em again…'" Axel chuckled, as apparent enemies brought flamethrower, shouting the line between volleys of flame. Roxas found it less amusing, and had a petrified death grip on Axel's hand, his designated "eye shield." Exactly how bloody animated violence was worse than bloodless, very real, Heartless-related violence was something that never crossed his mind.

About fifteen minutes in, it was becoming increasingly apparently that this movie was both a tie-in to something no one in the Organization had ever watched, and that it was very, very much not a family movie. Yet, after the sight of another young girl character standing, completely unclothed, with the much older Commander, no one seemed willing to get up and stop the horror. It had to be the same principle as watching a train wreck, Demyx concluded. On another note, it was really a testament to the sheer insanity of whoever directed this piece that it could have somehow gone downhill from the freaky DVD menu… then gone to a main character so deep in his own angst he nearly as responsive as the girl from the beginning he had- no, wait, best to block out that memory. And yet, somehow, it only seemed to be getting _worse._

The girl from the beginning was awake now, at least. Huddled inside a giant robot (giant robot? Where had that come from?), submerged at the bottom of a lake, ignoring all armed forces trying very, very hard to kill her, muttering in a way that bordered on the insane as a mysterious voiceover kicked in, but alive.

_She's actually kind of cute, as cartoons go,_ Demyx thought, _I hope she makes it._

That hope was almost enough to get him through the rest of the nightmare. Finally, the girl (Asu-something, he hadn't caught all of her name) snapped out of it and, with her at the controls, the giant mecha got to its feet, rising out the lake and throwing a entire ship out of its way. The battle had begun.

One giant robot versus an entire army.

And the robot won. Demyx didn't even bother trying to stifle his cheering.

"Demyx, have you ever heard of Murphy's law?" Axel asked.

"Yeah, why?"

"You know it's in full effect in this movie, right?" He gestured at the screen.

"Uh…"

And then it got worse again, to put it mildly.

"Does this young lady remind anyone else of Larxene? Just a thought." Xemnas added, breaking the mood a little, since the lady in question was currently having her (apparently biologically based) robot's entrails torn out by newly deployed monster mechas, and some kind of mind link ensured she felt every little nibble.

"Ever notice people shrug off really serious injuries in these kinds of shows?" Luxord noticed, "Look, the woman with the purple hair just took a bullet and she's acting fine."

"I'm sorry," Axel said, sarcastically, "I can't hear you over the incredibly creepy subtext between her and the emo kid who's probably half her age."

"Stop killing the mood!" Roxas and Demyx both snapped. Axel, Xigbar and Luxord were the only ones not completely absorbed by this point; everyone seemed to have given up and was just trying to enjoy the movie while there were some spots of hope left.

And then the movie took those spots of hope and set them on fire.

* * *

Forty-five minutes, two mental breakdowns, and one massive mind-breaker of an acid trip of a movie later, Axel stood in front of Saix, arms crossed in front of his chest, awaiting his sentence.

Saix stared at the DVD case in his hand, and then at Axel, and then back at the DVD. "_End of Evangelion?" _Saix said, giving Axel an angry, incredulous look, "Really, Axel? Just… really?"

Axel shrugged. "What can I say?"

Saix shook his head. "You are not allowed back to the Blockbuster That Never Was, Axel. Ever." He told him, "And you had better hope Number XIV comes out of her 'happy place' for her mission tomorrow."

Saix walked away, but Axel distinctly heard him say to those still gathered in the TV room, "We're just going to rent _The Little Mermaid_ tomorrow, is that okay with everyone?"

* * *

_And then a whole ton of stuff happened, and there was this naked girl the size of a planet and I'm not entirely sure what happened after that. But we had to go and cheer up Xion afterwards, because she'd kind of curled up and shut down and gone to her "happy place". We lots of ice cream, and Axel had me go get Toy Story from the Blockbuster That Never Was. So we all got to watch it together and she was fine after that. Demyx didn't come out of his room for a week, though._

_Oh, and then Demyx rented some more Evangelion stuff when it was his turn to pick a movie. Apparently, there's a TV series behind the movie, and he thought that would help us understand the movie better._

_It didn't. _

* * *

**Okay, this one was a quickie, but after the massive wall-o-text that was the last chapter I daresay you guys are thankful for it. **

**And yes, End of Evangelion is very, very, horrifyingly real. Watch in all it's mind-breaking glory here:**

**http:/www (dot) youtube (dot) com/watch?v=IPRxtCitK28 (warning, first part is the most NSFW bit!)**

**For maximum effect, watch while reading this, though this ficlet only covers everything up to Asuka's fight with the EVA series. For bonus points, watch both the movie and the TV series, and see how many creepy parallels you can find between Rei and Xion. For an entire bonus round, compare Shinji, Asuka and Rei to Roxas, Axel and Xion, respectively. **

**For the record, I am aware that it's funny that **_**Toy Story **_**caused Ienzo to be scared of his **_**teddy bear**_**, of all toys. Also, I know it seems unlikely that EoE and **_**Legend of the Overfiend**_** would both get shelved in the kids section… but I have, and I'm not making this up, seen **_**Elfen Lied**_** across the isle from **_**Kung Fu Panda**_** in Circuit City. And if you look on TV Tropers, under the Troper Tales page for "What Do You Mean, It's Not For Kids?" you can find more horror stories of anime that's terrifying for some adults getting put with the kids stuff, including the infamous **_**Legend of the Overfiend. **_**But here, the shelving arrangement is mostly exaggeration for comic effect. o3o;;**


	5. Valentine's Day?

**No journal entry prelude today, guys. Couldn't think of one. :P **

* * *

The Unseen Days

Chapter 5: Valentine's Day?

* * *

Pinks and reds and chocolate browns everywhere, in the shape of the little lights that the Heartless released, all arranged in bouqets of the bright colors of flowers and the soft pastels of little trinkets; the displa y was a bit like the sunset; colorful, and beautiful, but at the same time eye-watering to look at.

Xion stared at it, torn between curiousity and the desire to get the ice cream bars up to her friends before they melted.

Tearing her eyes away, Xion continued through the shopping district, slowing down at every turn to examine some other stand showing things in the same colors, both interested and puzzled.

_These things weren't here a few weeks ago…_ She thought, _But… they did bring out all those lights and the trees two months ago… Wait, ice cream! _

Looking away from another bright pink distraction, Xion quickened her pace to get up to the clock tower before the ice cream turned into salty blue goo.

"Hey guys!" She called; Roxas and Axel looked up at the sound of her voice.

"Xion!" Axel greeted, "You took a while."

"Sorry," Xion said, passing out the sea salt ice cream and taking her customary place to Roxas's left, "But there was all this pink stuff all over the town."

Her confusion returned when her words made Axel nearly choke on a bite of ice cream and give her a look of quiet horror. "Was there another giant tentacle Heartless?" He asked, visibly relaxing when Xion shook her head. "Good,"

"There was just all this heart-stuff everywhere." Xion said, thinking back to backdrops of floating white and red hearts on a pink sky; it had made her oddly nostalgic, and she didn't know why…

"Hey," Roxas chimed in, "I saw those when I got the ice cream yesterday. There was chocolate there too!"

"Aahhh…" Axel said; Xion leaned a little closer, sensing one of Axel's incoming tidbits about the life normal people led. "Hearts and chocolate means it's almost Valentine's Day." And then he let it hang, so that…

"What's Valentine's Day?" Right on cue, Roxas would ask about it.

"It's a holiday," Axel explained, "People celebrate it by giving the people they care about chocolates and stuff." He took another bite of ice cream."Personally, I never cared about it much." Axel added.

"What's with the hearts and stuff, though? And the pink?" Roxas went on; Xion was listening intently as well.

"That just got kind of roped into it. Don't ask me how." Axel shrugged.

There was quiet for a moment, before Roxas joked, "Something tells me Marluxia's would've loved it."

Axel snorted, "Oh yeah. You should've seen it when he first joined. I remember RTC-ing one day to find the entire castle painted pink."

They laughed, and Axel continued, "Then, he tried making chocolates in the shape of our sigil! And then… it turned out they were spiked with laxative. There's a reason we called him the Graceful_ Assassin_."

It went on like this, like it always did, though Xion had been distracted since Axel's explanation about Valentine's Day. In the back of her mind, an idea had started to form…

"Xigbar!" Xion called, upon her return to the castle. Roxas looked at her, the question already in his eyes, but Axel's hand on his shoulder stopped him. With a whisper of "Girl things. Best to leave her alone," the boys let the matter drop.

"Ah, Poppet," Came Xigbar's voice from… above? Xion looked up, to see the Freeshooter on the ceiling, moments before he dropped to the floor beside her. "What's up?" He asked.

Xion glanced over her shoulder at her friends. Axel raised an eyebrow and Xion gave the pair of them a reassuring smile, then turned back to Xigbar.

"Did Marluxia save his chocolate recipe?" She asked in a low voice. Xigbar looked at her, surprised, as Xion hastily added, "I'm not gonna try and poison it! I just… wanted to make chocolate," She leaned in even closer, bringing up one hand to the side of her face and dropping her voice so it was barely audible. "For Valentine's Day,"

"Ahh," Xigbar said, smiling mischieviously, "Finally making a move on Tiger, 'eh?"

Xion stared at him, confused. "…huh?"

"Nevermind," Xigbar chuckled, "Come on, I'll show you where he kept it."

Behind them, Axel watched Xion walk off with Xigbar. Roxas craned his neck to try and see what was going on. "What're they doing?" He asked.

Axel just shook his head, already imagining what Xion was up to. "I already said, Rox'. Girl stuff. Best not to question it,"

"So, these are the ingredients…"

"Yup. All here."

"Mix them all together…"

"Careful, Poppet."

"It's just a blender, Xigbar."

"Yeah, but you're supposed to use a mixing bowl."

A pause.

"…oh"

…Sometime later…

"I-is Xigbar gonna be alright?" Xion stammered, as Xaldin checked over the unconsious Freeshooter.

"Yes, with a few days rest…" Xaldin said dismissively, "…what was in that chocolate recipe, anyway?"

"Well, I took out the laxatives… but… there might've been something else Marluxia put in there…"

Xaldin raised a scythe-shaped eyebrow, "You used Marluxia's recipe?"

Xion nodded, and Xaldin held out a hand for the offending object. With a start, Xion fumbled around in her pockets for the card it was written on, and handed it over.

Xaldin looked over the recipe and sighed, "Of course…"

"What?"

"Nothing, nothing, he'll be fine." Xaldin was snapping on a rubber glove. "But you'll want to leave the room for this."

Xion found herself wandering back down to Twilight Town's shopping district. Well… if homemade chocolate wasn't going to work out…

_I wanted this to be… well, special,_ Xion thought, surveying little variety packs of truffles_, but if it can't be helped…_

Then, an arrangement of heart-shaped chocolates caught her eye, and her ideas returned in full force. _Of course,_ she realized, that was that thing that all of them lacked…and that would've let them care about one another in the first place…

Xion ran off, summoning her Keyblade. She had Heartless to find.

Around holidays, as Xion would later note, and as her superiors before her had noted, the Heartless became more active. Vexen had theorized that the charged emotions, the bubbling excitement, and especially the fluttering Hearts of young lovers fomented the Heartless into attacking more often. For Vexen, this was a fascinating bit of information, and reason to perform experiments, for _science_. For Xion, this meant her self-given mission was easier to accomplish.

The monkey-like Heartless weren't quite like the ones Xion usually found around Twilight Town, though they seemed like vaguely familiar somehow. Had Xion had memories of a human life, or at least knowledge of tertiery sexual characteristics, it would've struck her how funny it was that a blue monkey Heartless was barreling through the back alleyways with a much more feminine orange monkey Heartless, which came complete with a red bow on its head. As such, though, Xion was focused more on the little lights – the Hearts – that the Heartless released when she bopped them on the head.

The first few times she'd tried this, the Hearts had risen into the air too fast for her to catch. This time, though, she was ready, and caught the pinkish lights with both hands.

Axel and Roxas were standing in one of the Castle's many, many, _many_ spacious hallways; one of the open ones, with vaulted windows overlooking the dark void that was the sky of the World That Never Was.

"So…" Roxas said, approaching the subject with his usual bluntness, "What're 'girl things'?"

Axel shrugged, "It's just… y'know… things exclusive to the fairer sex, that we, possessing Y chromosomes instead of their double-X's, can never comprehend."

Roxas gave him a blank look. "…Huh?"

"Exactly, Roxas. Exactly,"

Then Xion ran up, "Hey guys!" She called. She slowed to a stop in front of them, her face flushed and her hands clasped in front her chest, like she had something trapped inside them.

"What's up, Xion?"

"Well," Xion was smiling and shifting from foot to foot, "Since you told us about Valentine's Day, I got an idea…"

"Oh?" Axel said, his suspiscions confirmed… part of them, anyway.

"Yeah!" Xion exclaimed, "I got you something!"

She opened her hands and let the two Hearts go. The three watched them float up, up and away into the void.

"For you," She said, "So that… you'll be whole one day."

Axel and Roxas looked at Xion. Axel moved first, putting an arm around her. Roxas followed suit.

"Thanks, Xion." Roxas said.

Xion smiled, "Happy Valentine's Day, you two."

* * *

**Hurrah, for short, sappy one-shots! This is my first time writing cute fluffy stuff, though, so there's probably lots of cuter V-day stuff out there, but hey, everyone's gotta start somewhere, right?**

**My apologies to my brother, though, as the joke he proposed for the very end of this ficlet makes absolutely no sense, and thus will not be included. I am sorry, but the topic of Heartless head lice will forever remain an inside joke between us. **


	6. Memories

They were perfectly within limits to question what he did. Just so long as this didn't ask on those questions.

It was all empty gestures. The Organization was not a sentimental bunch and held a thinly veiled disdain for all of it. They were just going through the motions, mimicing familial warmth. But sometimes – only sometimes – doing it all would bring back a faint, precious memory for Xemnas. That was what was most important.

Dinner together was a solemn affair, unless Xigbar decided he would make it more interested via zero gravity effects. Conversation was typically hushed, each attending to their own. At least until, again, Xigbar would cause trouble and rile someone up (_and Terra would follow up his own joke with a laugh, earning giggles, a warm smile, and a slight sparkle from dead blue eyes_). Roxas would follow discussions he barely understood like a tennis match, head turning when the talk reached some else's court (_and Ven would start speaking up for the first time, asking about things, chiming in a like a little kid)._

During clean up, Xemnas would watch Roxas with particular interest. He wasn't sure _why_, but he felt drawn to the Keyblade wielder's Nobody. Once, almost automatically, or like his body was on autopilot, Xemnas had actually ruffled the boy's hair as he passed him in the hall. Roxas had frozen completely and - _Ven laughed, and he and Terra headed outside to the gardens together_ – had looked absolutely petrified.

Movie night; that was often controversial, though most were at least polite about it (less so after Axel's indiscretion with _End of Evangelion_ – No. XIV still eyed every glass of orange juice she passed with suspision). Sometimes the one whose turn it was to pick the movie phoned it in entirely and just grabbed something random off the shelf. Then, they'd end up watching a terrible B movie (_the two of them laughing on at absurdity of it, with Ven wedged in between them, sincerely enthralled_) and sometimes the more mean-spirited members would pick horror films out of spite. Demyx would jump at small noises for hours afterwards (_like Ven would, before they'd all shelter in a pillow fort in his request and fall asleep there)._

Xemnas would hang on to those scraps as they drifted across his mind's eye, like an old dream. Each was a brief flash and he could never hold them for long. They slipped fluidly through his fingers, evading capture.

In the room – his secret room, past all the old things, the old experiments and the ghosts of the pasts (sealed, but watching him, ever waiting and watching…) - he told _her_ of these things. Sometimes, Xemnas thought she'd talk back. He'd hold the armored hand, cold and dead except for _once_ – once, when he could remember kind warmth wrapped around him – and promise her that they'd all be together again soon.

He could sense it. Ven was close. He'd find him first, then they'd go and find Aqua together. But until then-

Xemnas lay on the floor of the Room of Repose, hand in hand with the cold armor, dreaming of mountain fields and days together. He dreamed of both days gone by and days to come.


	7. Xigbar's Stories

**Hi, I'm not dead. **

**I'm back, I'm writing, I'm addicted to Tumblr and a laundry list of new fandoms, and I've finally got some new ideas! However a lot of the ones you'll see for the next few days will be very short and chock-full of headcanon.** **Also crossovers. That's my _modus operandi,_ right there. When in doubt? Write crossovers.**

**Not a lot of these have journal entries, either. Hope that's not a disappointment. Also, the reason I didn't write in an author's note at the beginning of the last chapter is because I had to upload it at the library due to internet problems brought on by family problems. The connection there was so slow I could've caught up on my reading while waiting for this editor to pop up...**

* * *

_Someone's got to teach that kid some life lessons. _

_-II._

* * *

Waiting. Biding his time. Waiting for the right moment and…

"What the- ew, Xigbar!"

Gotcha.

"Heh, pizza's here!"

Xigbar ran off, leaving Demyx picking bits of cheese out of his hair. Just another advantage of being able to walk on the ceiling.

Stir up trouble. Pretend to kidnap Xehanort and fight Terra. Hold off Aqua and buy time. He was always the second player, a knight at least if not a pawn, never the mastermind.

But he sure as hell had a mind of his own. And now, he _had _to put his own plans into motion… for he was now under the thumb of an amnesiac twit.

Would he ever say that out loud? No. But Xemnas _was_ incredibly spacey at times. He was always sitting there, high on his seat in the Round Room, dreaming up lofty ideas. Xigbar, on the other hand, had the duty of working at ground level and ensuring Xemnas wasn't taken down from the foundations by the details.

"Hey Xigbar!" somone called from below him. Xigbar looked up – or rather down – and saw Roxas waving at him.

"What are you doing?" Roxas asked.

"Eh, not much. What're you up to, Tiger?"

Roxas shrugged. "I was just going to practice with the Keyblade… or something."

Xigbar's interest was piqued. Ten years on and he was still fascinated by the Keyblade.

"Hang on, I'll join you," Xigbar said, dropping to the ground.

They headed for the Hall of Empty Melodies. Pretentious name aside, Xigbar remembered it being constructed especially for practicing with their abilities. Roxas even had most of his aptitude essessment missions here. Xigbar had been on the ceiling for some of them, watching him run for his life from Dusks.

Xigbar and Roxas took stances on opposite sides of the room. Xigbar's trigger finger itched on his arrowguns as Roxas rushed him, arm drawn back to strike.

Xigbar didn't warp out of the way, just took a quick step to the side. He watched the prongs whizz by his head, then stepped behind its wielder and pressed the gun between Roxas's shoulder blades.

The weight, light as it was, was just enough to make Roxas overbalance. The Keyblade went spinning as he faceplanted.

"Not bad," said Xigbar, "pretty amateurish, though."

"Well _thanks_," Roxas shot back, picking himself up off the floor.

"Ah, don't blame yourself. I've been using this baby," he twirled one of his guns, "for an… upwards of ten years, now that I think about it."

"Really?" Roxas asked, then looked at his own Keyblade. "…I haven't been using this that long," he realized.

"Nope. _And_ I've fought way more experienced Keyblade Wielders," Xigbar said, remembering quite vividly the Keyblades he'd seen ten years ago. Each was intricate, and even he could see they were intensely personal to the person who handled them. Not like the Kingdom Key, which seemed almost… generic.

"Really?" Roxas asked, "What were they like?"

Oh boy.

"Well," Xigbar began, "They'd… been using them a lot longer. And they'd been taught specifically how to use them. No offense, but you're lacking in both departments."

"Huh," Roxas looked down morosely at his weapon. "Were you ever taught how to use your guns?"

"Of course," said Xigbar.

"How?" Roxas pursued.

Xigbar had never fancied himself a guardian, or a teacher, or anyone who should be left alone with a child, period. But he'd been doing surprisingly well with Xion.

_("I went to a school for magic. I was brought up to be a guard. Then, one day, I decided I was sick of the whole shebang and ran off." _

"_Really?" _

"_Yup. I travelled all the worlds I could get to, and eventually wound up on Radiant Garden. But not before I made a few friends."_

"_Like who?")_

Xion wasn't entirely like Roxas, though. Roxas was a lot more curious. A lot moodier. A lot more impressionable.

_("A princess. A pair of 'em, actually, and a lord who everyone said was a royal scumbag but was actually pretty cool. He taught me everything I know about pranking, and how to do the floaty thing.")_

"But I thought you got that power as a Nobody," Roxas said, puzzled.

"Nah, I've been doing that for years."

Xigbar snapped his fingers, and Roxas suddenly found himself floating a foot off the ground.

"Hey! What the-"

"_That_ I only learned when I became a Nobody," Xigbar said.

He let Roxas down, none too gently, and left the poor boy sprawled on the floor again. He would continue to do that a few dozen times throughout their session. It'd teach Roxas to keep his guard up (as if he could do anything other than struggle and squirm once the Lo-Grav field hit).

_("So one day the princesses got tired of Lord I'm-too-great-for-gravity's antics and staged a revolution. With six magic stones and the POWER OF FRIENDSHIP they encased him in stone! But not before darkness had corrupted the youngest's heart. So she tried to usurp her sister. But Big Sis wouldn't hear any of that."_

"_What happened to the younger sister? Did she fight her big sister?"_

"_As if. Little Sis just got grounded. On the moon."_

"_And you saw all that?"_

"_Nah, I got outta dodge after Lord Prankster got taken for granite. Then I landed in Radiant Garden on a shooting star, went to college, got an apprenticeship with a buddy of mine, and here I am.")_

Roxas got back to his feet for the upteenth time and Xigbar took his original place on the training ground. "Now, are we gonna keep going?"

Roxas answered by running at him with his Keyblade drawn again. Geez. Attack, attack, attack. Couldn't this kid think of any _strategies?_

* * *

The next day, Roxas told Axel and Xion about his training session with Xigbar over ice cream.

"Oh," Axel said, "I was wondering where all those bruises came from."

Roxas laughed, briefly. "Yeah, he was pretty tough."

"He was also holding back," Axel said, leaning in with a sly smile on his face. "If he'd been serious you'd be in a full body cast, not Scooby Doo band-aids."

Roxas scowled and punched Axel in the shoulder. "Oh, haha. Who's the Organization's secret weapon against the Heartless, again?"

"Xion is."

The three of them cracked up laughing.

"So anyway," Roxas continued, "He told me all about where he came from, and how he was friends with a princess from another world, and how some guy there taught him how to teleport."

Axel raised an eyebrow at him. "Really, now?" He put an arm around the young Nobody. "Roxas, Roxas, Roxas… so innocent…"

"What?"

"Well, I just think it's funny that you don't know when you're being had," Axel said with a shrug.

"What'd you mean, 'being had'?" Roxas asked.

"I mean 'being tricked', since Xigbar got you with the stupidest lie I've heard out of him." And Axel was lost in laugher again.

"Wha- really!"

"Trust me Roxas, I've been here as long as he has, and he's told fifty different versions of how he learned to teleport!" Axel snorted. "Xion, that goes for you too! Don't believe everything you hear, especially from Xigbar!"


	8. Trust Me

**I warned you about the crossovers, bro. **

**I told you, dog.**

**(Also, this'll evolve into a multi-parter. However, this chunk of chapters is leading up to something... special.)  
**

* * *

It was accepted amongst the Organization that everyone had their own things. Being a bunch of freaks, these things were freaky things. For the sake of their individual tenacious grips on sanity, everyone did their own thing and did their best to ignore one another. The best policy for living with Organization XIII? _Don't ask._ Not even if there was a suddenly a large marble bust blocking the door way or a suspicious dark stain on the wall that had _not_ been there yesterday. It was better for everyone involved if you just didn't ask.

Xaldin never asked, but that didn't stop him from noting every Denzel Washington relief that stopped Demyx from getting out of his bedroom, or every dark patch that Saix swore up and down wasn't blood (and, when Xaldin showed conclusively that it _was_ blood, insisted it wasn't his).

He'd documented and found plausible answers for everything without having to ask, except for one strage occurrence. A sound of the alarm, inexplicable, that always traced back to Luxord…

After the eleventh time it happened, Xaldin learned to go straight for him.

"Luxord, the Dragoons have alerted me to an intruder in the castle. Have you see-"

Xaldin stopped dead when he stepped into the Brink of Despair and saw what Luxord was up to. No. X of the Organization had set up a table made from his giant cards and was _having tea_ with a man in suede with a red bow tie and a fez. Just to cap off the weird, a blue telephone booth imprinted with the words "police box" stood inexplicably over the absurd little scene.

"…what is going on here?" asked Xaldin. His mind was already calculating every possible scenario. This man in the bowtie and fez was no doubt the intruder, but his being with Luxord could mean any range of things…

"Ah, Xaldin!" said Luxord amiacablly. He sprang to his feet and dragged Xaldin over to the man in the bow tie. "I'd like to introduce you to an old friend of mine. Xaldin, this is the Doctor. Doctor, Xaldin."

The Doctor took to Xaldin with the same enthusiasm. "Hello there, Xaldin!" There was a twinkle in his eye as he sounded out the unusual name. "Wonderful to meet you. I was just popping in to say hello. We go back, Luxord and I, old school friends."

Xaldin watched the Doctor bounce around like a little kid in an adult's body. "What," he said flatly.

"Well, when you've got all of time and space to explore, you _can_ visit old schoolmates." The Doctor looked to Luxord again. "By the way, last I heard of you, you were travelling too. Not with the time part, though, just the space part."

Luxord shrugged. "Never passed the Academy."

"Ah, that's too bad."

"Yeah. I wish Demyx hadn't gotten wind of it, though, however he did it. He's started calling me 'Void Lord,' and it gets old after a while."

Xaldin watched and listened to all of this, his brain processing everything he was hearing but the rest of him refusing to believe it. The Castle _had_ its intruders, but they were usually Heartless. Yet the Doctor had managed to get near the top of the Castle before even the most vigilant Assassins had spotted him. _And_ he'd gotten the police box in.

"But I did _eventually_ get time powers, look." Luxord waved a hand and everything slowed down, moving like thick honey. Everything froze for a minute, and then Luxord and the Doctor were near the balcony, having jumped a dozen feet in a second.

"…only one heart?" the Doctor was going on again, "How do you manage?"

"Oh, you get used to it."

"HOLD UP!" Xaldin yelled. Both men jumped at the sudden outburst.

"What in the world is going on here? What is your purpose… _time travelling_ in here?" he asked the Doctor. He'd summoned his lances and was aiming all of them at the stranger. "How in the world do you know Luxord? What do you mean, 'only one heart?'"

Luxord did not react, but the Doctor inclined his head politely towards Xaldin. "I'm only visiting," he said, voice level and calm for the first time. "And I promise I didn't mean to impose. I'm just visiting an old friend I haven't seen in a while. As for the hearts," he regained his manic energy and bounded toward Xaldin again. Slipping expertly past the razor-sharp spears, in a moment he'd seized his hand and pressed it to his chest, "Gallifreyans have a binary vascular system."

There was a heartbeat under Xaldin's hand, and a second one when the Doctor held against the other side of his chest. "But," he continued, "Luxord's lost one of his somehow, and he was just explaining to me the series of events that caused him to lose it."

Xaldin, again, could not believe what in the world he was looking at.

"Actually," Luxord suggested, a devilish look appearing in his eye, "we could _show_ him how."

Xaldin instinctively backed away. "What in the world are you talking about, No. X?"

"Indeed," said the Doctor.

The pair seized him and began to haul him towards the police box.

"Hey- HEY, what are you doing-" He protested. But they already had him through the door.

Xaldin had honestly been expecting the dark interior of a phonebooth. He' d been expecting the small confines of a box was exactly the size it appeared to be. But that was not what awaited him.

Once he was through the door, Xaldin stumbled into a sort of control center ringed by soft yellow lights. A console of sorts stretched up to the ceiling, a glass tube surrounded by bits and bobs and knobs whose purpose he couldn't even begin to fathom. There was no way this could be real…

He froze up completely. "It's bigger on the inside…"

The Doctor smiled. "I love it when they say that."


	9. Origins

**More crossovers. Subtler ones. Don't worry if you don't get all the references in this one... but if you do, I love you.**

* * *

So many assumed Proof of Existence was some sort of graveyard. It wasn't. It was just a directory to the nooks and crannies that the Organization's individual members haunted most frequently. Xemnas, of course, had the top-most spire of the castle. Axel had another spire – a look out post of sorts. It was tucked away into the contours of Never Was, but provided an unobstructed view of both the castle and the city surrounding for miles. Unfortunately, it was a poor place for what Axel was aiming to do, and the Hall of Empty Melodies was simply too public. Luxord's little corner, the Brink of Despair, however, had adequate space for his intentions.

It was difficult to catch Luxord out on a mission, due to his tendency to exploit time travel to give himself as much free time as possible. When Axel could, however, he made sure to use every moment he could.

"_Cross Star," _The familiar rune circle appeared in burning red-orange at his feet. _"Fire!"_

Tiny embers in the shape of four-pointed stars shot up from the ground. They wound their way into the air, trailing fire like comets' tails. The stars raced and struck at each other. The collisions sent sparks into the air.

Axel kept count in his mind, trying to sustain the spell. Damn, this was _much_ harder without his old Device… if there was one thing he could've done over from the day he became a Nobody, he would not have left Fireheart with the kid.

At his command, Assassin Nobodies rose out of the ether to be Axel's targets. The Cross Star spell honed in on them, imbedding themselves in the Nobodies. The ones the spell missed turned towards their commander.

In this heightened state of awareness, Axel knew just what to do. He held out a hand and spread a Round Shield spell. The lesser Nobodies bounced off and with a snap of his fingers, having nothing to do with his powers as a Nobody, the remaining Assassins burst into flame.

Excellent, Axel thought, breathing hard. The Mid-Childan magic system didn't look complicated to an outsider, but practicing it was always a tough work out. Axel could work himself to death exterminating Heartless with his chakrams and still not exert himself as much as he did with these simple exercises.

Maybe his skill was slipping. Maybe it was just _that much harder_ without his Device.

Axel suddenly froze when he heard slow clapping behind him. He turned, expecting Saix to be there, only to find Vexen standing on the threshold.

"Impressive," No. IV drawled. "Those were very basic defense spells, Mid-Childan style… but pure, Belkan elemental magic. I've never seen anyone do that in person. It's a rare skill." Axel bristled defensively. How the hell did Vexen know about his magic style? "I don't recognize that first one though."

"It's one of my own," Axel snapped. "It's a hybrid-type. Belkan melee-style and Mid-type shooting."

"Fascinating," Vexen strode a few steps closer. Axel held his ground. "I'd love to see the notes some time."

Axel waved him off. "I made it ten years ago. I don't have 'em."

"Perhaps you'd rather discuss it? I'm sure I have some theoretical spell material you'd be interested in."

Axel began to stride off, eager to get away from Vexen. "Eh, maybe another time."

He quickly walked off into a Dark Corridor.

Axel had never met someone outside of Mid-Childa's influence who knew about the system. Furthermore, he'd never met anyone but Saix who'd tried or was even interested in hybridizing the modern Mid-Childan and ancient Belkan magic types. This was worrisome.

He'd be keeping a close eye on Vexen.


	10. Bump in the Night

**Bluh. My contentment with this one fluctuates violently. **

**This was intended to be a sort of an alternate version of what Lexy and Zexy were up to during _The Storm, pt. 2._**

* * *

"Zexion?"

The Nobody in question snapped out of his trance. "Yes, Lexaeus?"

"Are you alright? You've been staring at that knife for a while, now…"

Zexion looked back at the large kitchen knife and away again. "Ye- yes, I'm fine."

He jumped about a foot in the air when Lexaeus put a hand on his shoulder. "Perhaps I should chop the vegetables," he said, guiding Zexion over to the arrangement of spices.

Zexion took a deep breath. "Yes, that seems smart," he said.

Lexaeus took to slicing for the mushrooms for the recipe while Zexion rolled chicken bits in flour and spice for seasoning. It wasn't that he minded cooking. No, it was certain… kitchen implements.

"Might I ask what the problem was?" Lexaeus inquired after a moment.

The sound of the bowl shifting in the countertop ceased.

"Don't tell the Nymph," Zexion said.

"I never would."

Zexion teetered on the edge of speech for a moment, starting and stopping then starting again. "I… I don't like knives. I never have. It's been a phobia of mine since I was small. I _cannot_," his fists clenched so hard the knuckles of his bare hands turned white, "take them near my face, or my eyes."

For a moment, the only sound in the kitchen was Zexion getting his suddenly frantic breathing under control, like acknowledging his reactions had dug up old memories and he needed a moment to bury them again.

Lexaeus did not pursue the subject. Whoever or whatever had attacked Zexion, bringing it up would only cause him undue distress.

Suddenly, there was a faint _pop,_ and then blackness.

There was silence for a while. Lexaeus sighed faintly – it had been a while since the last incident, but that did not stop it from being extremely irritating. The procedure of "drop everything and report to the Round Room to see who was messing with the wiring _this time_" had interrupted one too many a recipe.

Zexion broke it as his breathing sped up again, as classic sign of distress. If he had had a heart, Lexaeus would've been able to hear his pulse send vibrations through the floor.

"Lexaeus," Zexion said, tone clipped and voice wavering ever so slightly, "put the knife down." When he heard the soft clater of the knife on the countertop, he moved slowly towards the door, feeling his way.

"Come on, it's procedure," he said, pausing for just a moment when his shoulder brushed against Lexaeus's arm.

He lingered for a moment – but only a moment – and went out into the hall without another word. Lexaeus stayed behind him, keeping a silent, if unseeing, vigil.

There was a level of caution as Lexaeus and Zexion felt their way through the darkened halls. As he had since Zexion was a child, Lexaeus took it upon himself to watch the boy. Zexion was more open, and at least appeared to be a little happier in his presence. Now, Lexaeus was watching the dark, straining to see any overt signs of Zexion's latest anxiety. When he was stressed, his illusionary power went out of control, and that could be a danger to the both of them.

Suddenly, Zexion was clinging to Lexaeus with a terrified howl.

"Zexion?"

"Don't let her near me," he shrieked.

Lexaeus put an arm around Zexion, like a parent comforting a child after a nightmare. Only this time, the nightmare had taken a life of its own.

"Relax. They were sealed long ago under the castle, and they can't get out now."

Zexion's breathing was heavy. Lexaeus traced up his arm and found one of the boy's hands covering his hidden eye.

Lexaeus looked up and shot a warning glance into the dark. A violet eye shone back at them, its pupil slitted like a cat's. The demoness of Zexion's past.

"Zexion, it isn't real. Focus your mind."

They kept moving straight toward the apparition. Zexion nearly froze with horror when they passed by it, his one hand still over his eye as if to protect it. Really though, there was nothing to be done. The wound had long since been done by the time Ienzo first came to Radiant Garden, with the one empty socket and the old scars.

It had made Aleaus's stomach churn just thinking about what had happened, and even now he had a desire to destroy whoever would do that to so small a child.

But the thing they walked by now was just an illusion, and the real monster had to be sealed away for Zexion's sake.

And, just a bit, for its own sake. A dark of pure darkness was as dangerous to itself as it was to others.


	11. Saix Hates Everything

**It's true, he does.**

**And now, to finish an Axel chapter at the very last minute tomorrow. It's a longer one, so... yeah, I'm screwed. **

**Demyx's chapter will be up the 13th no matter what, though.  
**

* * *

Saix, as his colleagues could attest, was an advocate of getting things done. Saix, as most of the Organization could affirm, would give you a job and expect it completed, exactly on the deadline with all accompanying paperwork signed in triplicate (whatever that meant). Saix, as several Nobodies (especially Demyx) complained, could give you a glare that would make your head explode until you did your allotted task along with said paperwork.

Saix was no fan of domestic tasks. Anything that didn't go towards the completion of Kingdom Hearts was worthless to him. Movie nights, dinner together, grocery shopping… especially the shopping. He half suspected Xemnas had lost his mind, the way he kept scheduling these things (or perhaps the Superior's mind had simply never been there to begin with…).

Unfortunately, these opinions of Saix's did not save him from shopping duty. The universe also hated him extra today, because Roxas was his appointed "shopping buddy."

"So, what's on the list first?" Roxas asked, taking a break from looking around the supermarket with the interest of a curious child. Saix had the list, and a very long list it was; if he let it roll out is was almost as long as he was tall.

"Deli-sliced turkey," Saix growled, moving the shopping cart as quickly as possible, just try to get this over with.

"I can go find it," Roxas volunteered. No, bad idea. Roxas would, inevitably, somehow find a way to get lost and it would take even longer to find him. But on the other hand…

"Go for it," Saix said, letting their newest member run off, leaving Saix blissfully free from the boy's idle chatter.

Some would have described Saix's dislike of Roxas as irrational; a by-product of his dismissal of all non-productive things. That was true, and at the same time, it wasn't.

It was true that it was the reason that the boy's questions annoyed him; Roxas was, in his eyes, barely a Nobody and more of a tool; he had, after all, spent his first week of "life" borderline catatonic. What did matter to him what normal kids did all day? Or what a heart was? However, it was when Saix saw No. 13 with Axel that he really felt like flipping a table over. That was the part that could be described as "irrational." When he saw the two together, which occurred more and more often these days, he could almost feel his old friend and possibly his last link to sanity drifting away.

However, as Saix was forbidden from harming No. 13 (in a permanent way, at least), he had to vent his frustration by jamming things like jelly beans (next item on the list, courtesy of Demyx) into the cart in as mean-spirited a way as possible.

Turkey, jelly beans… chocolate. No, it was scribbled out, and "dark chocolate" had been written underneath it. That would be Zexion and Lexaeus's silent debate about chocolate flaring up again.

Roxas, contradictory to Saix's hopes, had found the selected lunch meat and Saix himself rather fast. Saix would've happily sent him off on a quest to find some other thing on the list (possibly something that wasn't even on the list… or in existence to begin with… like headlighter fluid) just to get rid of him again, but Roxas was not very easily sent off.

"I don't get it," Roxas said, thinking out loud, "If turkeys are birds, why is turkey meat all thinly sliced?"

"Because they kill the bird and cut it all off," Saix answered, his tone quite venomous. Roxas, being Roxas, totally missed this little cue.

"Oh. Well, why are there so many… brands?" He said the word like he was truly unfamiliar with it.

"Roxas," Saix said, getting fed up. "Go find headlighter fluid."

Still puzzled, but thankfully obedient, Roxas walked off. Hopefully that would keep him occupied for a while.

Saix sighed to himself. The sooner they could complete Kingdom Hearts, the sooner Isa and Lea could go back to their own lives. And the sooner that happened, the sooner Saix would never have to put up with the idiots again.


	12. Dearly Dreaming Demyx

_Hilariously, this was the chapter I was the most eager to upload, but I promptly forgot about uploading. This hilariousness was compounded by the fact that it loses a bit of its impact unless it was uploaded on that specific day._

_So I decided, "Eh, I'll make it exactly a month late. Ironically."_

_And then I uploaded it after midnight. _

_Whatever. For what it's worth, this was supposed to be uploaded in April on Friday the 13th. _

* * *

_Day 80_

_Demyx is so weird sometimes. I caught him sleepwalking the other day. Axel says he does it all the time, but it's _freaky _when he walks around like he's awake but he's not… He's always talking about something I can't understand. It sounds like he's talking to someone._

* * *

You wake to the sound of fingers being snapped in your ear. Your eyes fly open and the world tilts crazily around you as you go from soaring high to bound to the ground. You stumble and catch something in front of you. Saix looks down at you, yellow eyes flashing in the dark like a wolf's, and he is not happy.

"You were sleepwalking," he says, then adds, _"again."_

"Sorry," you apologize, laughing weakly.

You straighten and quickly head for your room. Your eyelids are already getting heavy and you start to stumble drunkenly again. The ground beneath your feet vanishes and reappears, and you barely stay conscious long enough to flop down onto your bed.

Demyx the Dreamer. So you're called, and so you've been called since before the "X" had been scrambled into your name. The sleepwalking has been a problem since then too. Even when you were small, you would sometimes wake up to find yourself miles from home, and had to swim back before Father got too angry at you. Funnily enough, that's what eventually got you sort-of killed.

The second you hit the mattress and let sleep take you back, the room lightens and shines behind your eyelids. You open them a bit, and find the familiar sight of light shimmering in your old room, like the sun through water.

With a smile on your face, you immediately head for the window. The sky outside is still dark, but there's a ghostly blue light on the horizon. Cloudrise. The eclipse won't be for a few hours yet.

You haul yourself out the window and swan dive into the city below. This, you remember, is how you first learned what air was like. You bring yourself to a stop, like you'd hit water, and half-fly and half-swim through the sky. You still liked to pretend you were swimming, even though this dream-self of yours has always had legs instead of fins.

Everytime you awoke from another sleep-walking spell, you'd have so many stories to tell. Swimming through the sky on a human's legs, for one. Meeting actual humans, for another. Sure, they were always half asleep and never remembered you being in their tower rooms, but they were friendly enough, even when they didn't realize you were there.

You zigzag through the tallest towers, eight in total including your own, and dipped lower at the last two, avoiding the windows. You have had some sort of contact with all the humans except the ones in those towers. One, in the one you soared in circles around now, slept like the dead, reclining in the same regal golden nightthings you wore on this world with his hands clasped to his chest. The room had a somber air of a longing innocence to it, like that of a child's after he has died, or left the home. You had tried to wake him once, to no avail. So you had always stayed away from that tower.

And if that sleeping human had been a preserved corpse, then the one in the last tower was a mummy. You could never be sure, but there seemed something horribly off about the form hidden so completely underneath the blankets. You hadn't even tried waking him. You feared what you might find.

With the exception of the Mummy, as you started calling him, you eventually met all the other humans in your waking time. You realized it with a chill when you recognized Xemnas's face in your waking time; older, stranger, and colder, with his hair bleached pure white, but the same face. It may have been a coincedence, but meeting the others quickly disproved that. It was so strange, having known Isa Altima and Lea Mondial for years while Saix and Axel treated you so coldly. You laughed at jokes about time travel that Luxord told before he got to the punchline, and repeated the oddest details about flowers back to Marluxia before he even told you them. The photographs of the Keyblade wielder made you realize you knew him too, and you got to volunteer his name. Larxene had nearly gutted you as a stalker when you named her favorite books a few days after her joining, and laughed at you when you told the truth about how you knew.

You remembered greeting Saix with "Hi, Isa!" about a week after receiving your new name, and watching him do a double take.

"How-" he'd stammered, the first and last time you saw him so surprised, "How do you know-"

"That's your name, right?"

He'd looked at his shoes and taken a while to reply.

"It was," he finally said.

After that episode, you kept your dreams to yourself, pretending your life wasn't one long trip of _deja vu._

You always saw the big moments of your waking life as happening for a second time. After you awoke from another spot of sleepwalking and found yourself surrounded by a lot of very large Heartless, everything rolled unravelled like a film reel, and you almost felt like you were watching from someone else's point of view, detached from your body like your recently liberated heart. You knew that the Diver would jab his spear forward and hit you in the tail when you tried to dodge away, and that the one like a large jellyfish would shock the heart right out of you. It wasn't a surprise. You'd even given up the struggle because you knew it was supposed to happen.

_Supposed to happen._ Like everything that brought you to this place. Once, you'd asked after it all, and found didn't alleviate any of that odd, spacey feeling the visions gave you when they came to pass.

You waved to the citizens below as you passed, pale skin and mannequin bodies a blur as you go by. You flip and twist in midair the way your sisters used to when they showed off, and wished you still had your fins to add to the spectacle. They regard you fondly. You and the others are special to them, for some reason. They refer to you all by other names, all formal titles, too reverent to address you directly.

Waving for all to see, you ascend towards the lightening sky. You wait for the eclipse.

No one else stays out during the eclipses. The White Queen has advised against it since you were young, but that's never stopped you from doing it anyway. The feelings of the clouds singing against your skin is ecstasy itself, and you'd never dare miss one.

You hover for a while, but waiting for the clouds to draw near gets boring quickly. You look around for distraction and consider heading back to your dream room to play your sitar when you spot a tiny dark spot on top of one of the towers.

Isn't that tower – yes, it is! It's the Mummy's tower! Who is that? It couldn't be one of the mysterious comatose dreamers, could it?

You advance upon the newcomer as fast as possible. She isn't someone you recognize, not anyone from the Organization, but a girl with dark hair no older than Roxas. She's sitting back and watching the cloudrise when she notices you.

"Hi there!" you greet, nearly breathless with excitement. "You're awake!" Your syntax clearly perplexes the girl but you bluster on regardless. "You're like the one person I haven't met here and you're awake now!"

You land beside her and she looks up at you with big, brilliant blue eyes, still not sure what the hell is going on here. Those eyes aren't the cloudy ones of one dreaming unawares, like the others. They're crystal clear and alert.

"What's your name?" you ask, hoping that's more her speed.

She stares at you for a while longer and then gazes out at the ascending clouds, like she could see the answer there. "I'm not sure," she finally says, "I know I have one… it's on the tip of my tongue…"

"Is this your first time awake?" You ask, sitting down beside her.

"I guess it must be," the girl says with a shrug.

You stay there a while, watching the cloudrise that precedes the eclipse. The tower top was among the clouds, so you'll have the perfect front row seat already. However, you still crave to be higher and closer.

"Want to go flying?" you ask. It would have the bonus of relieving the boredom of waiting.

"You can _fly_ here?" The girl asks back, incredulous.

"Well, _duh,_" you say, "How else would you get up here?"

"Climbing."

You stand and walk to the edge of the tower. Instead of following the slope of the tower top, however, you continue in a straight path off into the void. You look back over your shoulder and motion for the dumbfounded girl to follow you. She takes several shaky steps and nearly slips and plummets to the city below, but finds her air legs and rises to your level.

"See?" you say as she looks down at her feet like she's expecting some sort of illusion or trickery.

You soar and flip around around the towers some more, showing the girl how it's done. She struggles to mimic you as you teach by example, and then introduce her to your fellow dreamers.

She shies away from Xemnas's sleeping form as soon as she sees him, but you cheer her up with a remarkably loopy Luxord next door. Sora is next, and he fascinates the girl. She drifts into his window, unhesitating, as soon as she sees him and only realizes how close she is when he looks over at her, eyes not really seeing. Axel is disappointingly boring this visit, but Saix is out of it enough that he's singing the theme song to _My Little Pony_.

The eclipse announces itself with a dramatic light show before you can introduce Larxene or Marluxia. The radiance plays off the polished golden towers and spires and cathedrals of the planet below as you take the girl by the hand and fearless lead her up to the clouds.

"It's starting," you tell her, but she's already entraced by the visions and pictures the clouds play out. The two of you ascend until you can barely feel gravity tug at you any longer. The girl's hand has been twined tightly with yours, but now loosens until you know you are free to fly as you please.

You accelerate and dive into the clouds like a dolphin through the waves. You are home.

Oddly enough, that is the last night you return to the dream world with its radiant clouds and golden towers. But it doesn't surprise you in the least when it turns out Xion was the girl from your dream.


End file.
